- New reveals have emerged from Epic Games’ antitrust case against Google
- According to them, Google has previously considered buying Epic in order to render it non-competitive
- Epic Games CEO Tim Sweeney claims that this was all planned unbeknownst to his company
The reveals continue as Epic Games’ cases against Google and Apple progress.
Google Apparently Considered Buying Epic
For some time now, Epic Games has bravely stood against the two tech giants that are Apple and Google. Epic critiques the latter two’s anti-competitive approach on the market, and in the course of the two lawsuits, many curious secrets have emerged. This time a new reveal shows that Google might have considered buying Epic, which might have been in order to eliminate it as a competitor.
The reveal was first reported by The Verge and came as a result of some document redactions being removed for the purposes of the lawsuit.
According to the findings, at one point, Google had secretly considered buying Epic Games. Epic’s chief executive officer Tim Sweeney revealed in a tweet that Epic Games was completely unaware of that and whether it was planned as negotiation or a takeover attempt.
From Epic’s point of view, this sounds like Google was working with the intention of establishing a monopoly on the market and eliminating any competitors.
Additionally, Google had reportedly negotiated with Epic. The former company had supposedly proposed a “special deal” about allowing Fortnite on Google Play and letting people directly download the game instead of sideloading it. Sideloading means downloading software from a third-party source instead of the Google Play Store and is usually difficult and not very user-friendly.
Fighting for a Fairer App Market
Epic Games is currently engaged in battle with both Google and Apple, with its flagship game Fortnite currently unavailable on both of them. Epic stands for a more free market and opposes the unjust taxation imposed by Google Play and the App Store, as well as their biased app ranking.
Google has denied most of the allegations and has said that their Google Play Store is free for all developers to use as long as they abide by the platform’s rules.
Google and Apple have problems with Epic Games’ Fortnite having an in-game V-bucks store that goes untaxed. Because of this, they consider Fortnite unsuitable to their stores and have therefore had it removed.
Regardless of how the lawsuits develop, it is undoubted that it has shed light on some curious facts about the industry that the public wouldn’t have had otherwise learned.
