WASHINGTON, June 17 WLF-anti-trust-online
WASHINGTON, June 17 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- The Washington Legal Foundation (WLF) today noted that antitrust regulators are likely to intensify their scrutiny of strategic arrangements or other business agreements which involve online commerce, particularly those which involve firms holding dominant market shares.
One recent development which could implicate such antitrust scrutiny, WLF stated, is the just announced arrangement between search market leaders Yahoo and Google under which Google would provide Yahoo access to its AdSense for search and content advertising programs.
The announcement comes several months after Google and Yahoo completed a two-week test of this arrangement, which at the time attracted the attention of legal commentators, antitrust regulators, and the U.S. Department of Justice.
"Google has been eager to assure people that this is not a merger of the top two online search companies," noted Glenn G. Lammi, Chief Counsel of WLF's Legal Studies Division. "Two companies need not merge their full functions in order to run afoul of competition laws. Any kind of combination between a dominant market leader and the company with the second largest market share will implicate antitrust concerns," said Lammi. He noted that the companies clearly have these concerns on their minds, given the fact that they limited the agreement to, in Google's words, "advertising programs on their U.S. and Canadian web properties." "Given the European Union's aggressive stance on tech-related antitrust matters, it's not surprising that they are staying out of Europe at this point," Lammi said.
At least one key federal policy maker, Senator Herbert Kohl, who chairs the antitrust subcommittee in the Senate Judiciary Committee, signaled his concern: "We will closely examine the joint venture between Google and Yahoo announced today. The consequences for advertisers and consumers could be far-reaching and warrant careful review, and we plan to investigate the competitive and privacy implications of this deal further in the Antitrust Subcommittee."
Washington Legal Foundation is a national, non-profit, public interest law and policy center. By utilizing a unique approach to forward its mission - publishing timely legal studies, engaging in innovative litigation, and communicating directly to the public - WLF has become the nation's most effective legal advocate of free enterprise.
SOURCE Washington Legal Foundation
