Google Shopping: 41 European founders and CEOs write to Commissioner Vestager
The founders and CEOs of 41 European comparison shopping services (CSSs) operating in 21 Member States with thousands of highly qualified digital-savvy talents in their employment have written a joint letter to Commissioner Vestager welcoming her appointment as Executive Vice-President in charge of digital and competition policy, and urging her to vigorously enforce the EC’s ground breaking Google Search (Shopping) decision of June 2017 (Shopping Decision) in order to - finally - bring Google’s competition infringements to an end.
While some signatories – including Hausfeld’s clients - have contributed to the investigation for quite a long time, most are now raising their voices for the first time, having become frustrated by the measures Google adopted following the Shopping Decision in order to circumvent such decision’s effect.
Partners Thomas Höppner and Lesley Hannah lead the Hausfeld teams in Berlin and London respectively:
“Today’s letter sends a strong message to the European Commission that Google’s current “remedy” is simply not working. The entire online comparison shopping industry in Europe is suffering and European consumers are being denied access to the benefits of being able to compare prices for products online and are likely to be paying inflated prices as a result. As signatories of the letter and original complainants, Hausfeld’s clients Foundem and idealo, wholeheartedly believe that now is the time for the Commission to enforce its decision, bringing an end to Google’s on-going infringement and restore competition in the market for online comparison shopping services in Europe.”
The CCSs set out how two years after the Shopping Decision, effective competition in the national markets for comparison shopping has not been re-established and how, despite participating in Google’s Compliance Mechanism, they have not experienced any substantial overall increase in traffic to their websites.