Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella called rival Google’s claim that it is simple to modify defaults on computers and devices “bogus.”
In a historic antitrust trial against its parent company Alphabet, Nadella made this claim while giving testimony.
Nadella testified at the trial, which was the first significant antitrust lawsuit the U.S. Department of Justice had launched since 1998, that Microsoft, another computer giant, had attempted to have its Bing search engine become the default on Apple handsets but had been turned down.
Google’s lead attorney John Schmidtlein pressed Nadella on the occasions when Microsoft did obtain default position on desktops and mobile devices, but consumers continued to overwhelmingly ignore Bing in favour of Google.
According to Schmidtlein, Microsoft made a number of strategic mistakes that prevented Bing from gaining traction, including failing to invest in servers or developers to advance Bing and missing the mobile revolution.
Schmidtlein added that customers bypassed the default and performed the vast majority of their searches on Google as a result of Microsoft’s achievement in becoming the default – on select Verizon phones in 2008, as well as BlackBerry and Nokia in 2011.
Bing is the default search engine on laptops, the majority of which run Microsoft operating systems, and Nadella recognised that its market share is under 20%.
According to the government, Google, which controls 90% of the search industry, illegally pays $10 billion annually to wireless providers like AT&T, smartphone manufacturers like Apple, and other parties to be the default search engine on their products.
“Changing defaults today is easiest on Windows and toughest on mobile,” Nadella said.
Long after Microsoft had been the target of its own federal antitrust litigation, Nadella was named CEO in 2014. This legal battle, which started in 1998 and culminated in a settlement in 2001, pushed Microsoft to change some of its business practices and made room for firms like Google.
