Google’s executive chairman Eric Schmidt will take center stage at a Senate hearing today into whether the Internet giant is abusing its dominant position in online search. The Mountain View, California-based Google has drawn increasing scrutiny from US and European regulators as it has grown over the years from a scrappy Silicon Valley startup into an Internet powerhouse.
European Union competition watchdogs began an investigation into Google in November and the US Federal Trade Commission (FTC) opened its own probe into the company’s lucrative search and advertising business in June. As it has grown, Google has branched out into various businesses including online mapping, shopping, travel and providing operating systems for mobile phones and tablet computers.
The Senate hearing, entitled ‘The Power of Google: Serving Consumers or Threatening Competition?’ targets the activity at the heart of Google’s livelihood: search. According to the tracking firm comScore, Google accounted for 64.8 percent of US search market share in August followed by Yahoo! with 16.3 percent. At issue in the hearing of the Senate Judiciary Subcommittee on Antitrust, Competition Policy and Consumer Rights is whether Google gives preference to its own websites or products in search results. Schmidt, who was replaced as Google’s chief executive by co-founder Larry Page in April, will be the star witness at the hearing. Schmidt said, “I think it’s fine that they’re investigating these sorts of questions. We have an opportunity to communicate what we’re doing.”
