A decision is expected soon from federal judge Amit Mehta on how tech giant Google (GOOGL) should change its search business to address concerns that it holds a monopoly over the search ad market. Unsurprisingly, this ruling could have major effects on the entire search industry, including older players like Microsoft’s (MSFT) Bing and Brave, and newer ones like OpenAI and Perplexity. One possible fix would be to make Google share its search data with other companies, but surprisingly, some of Google’s competitors say this could actually make things worse, not better.
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According to one CEO of a rival search engine, giving others access to Google’s data might make them more reliant on Google rather than helping them compete. Indeed, if Google is required to share its data through an API, it could offer the service at a much lower price because of its size, thereby undercutting companies like Bing and Brave that have spent years building their own data systems. OpenAI, for example, has admitted that it would struggle to match Google’s accuracy without access to its data, and it currently uses Google data through a third-party tool called SerpApi, which scrapes results from Google.
Interestingly, some believe that Google allows SerpApi to operate because it helps flood the market with cheap search data, which makes it harder for competitors with their own APIs to gain traction. In addition, even if rivals get access to Google’s data, using it wouldn’t be easy since Google collects billions of data points daily from its search engine, Chrome browser, Gemini chatbot, and more. As a result, Mozilla’s Firefox team says that only large tech companies have the resources to take full advantage of such data. Instead of sharing raw data, the CEO suggests a better way to boost competition would be to let rivals show Google ads on their own search engines and earn a share of the revenue.
Is Google Stock a Good Buy?
Turning to Wall Street, analysts have a Moderate Buy consensus rating on GOOGL stock based on 26 Buys and nine Holds assigned in the past three months. Furthermore, the average GOOGL price target of $216.16 per share implies 4.7% upside potential.
