Internet giant Google is the target of a new investigation undertaken by two US Government authorities to determine if the company has engaged in anti-competitive behaviour.
The US Federal Trade Commission announced this week that it will be investigating the links between the executive boards of Google and computer company Apple.
Google chief executive Erich Schmidt and former Genetech chief Arthur Levinson are on the boards of both companies.
Schmidt himself has hit out against that claim, and said in a meeting with shareholders yesterday that he has not stepped down from Apple because he does not view the group as a “primary competitor”.
Analysts have suggested this is similar to Microsoft’s troubles in the late 1990s, when it was caught in a legal battle with the Department of Justice over anti-trust accusations.
But Schmidt has said “there is no comparison” between the two companies, and said that “we should expect governments around the world to be interested in what we do and hold us to the principles we have articulated”.
The announcement came just one week after the Department of Justice said it would investigate Google for its contracts with publishing groups to put scans of full libraries on the internet.
The deal allows Google to create and sell digitised versions of books that have no known copyright holders. A company spokesperson said in a statement that Google is more than willing to cooperate with the Department of Justice.
“It’s important to note that this agreement is non-exclusive, and if approved by the court stands to expand access to millions of books in the US,” the spokesperson said, but did not comment on the case investigating Schmidt and Levinson.
Google’s attorney, Kent Walker, said that the company is in talks with the Trade Commission.
Although Schmidt said he is confident that there will be a “fundamentally good outcome” of the two situations, it is not the first legal battle the company has fought. Last year the company dropped a partnership with Yahoo to avoid scrutiny from the Department of Justice.
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Patrick Stafford is a freelance journalist and a former deputy editor of SmartCompany.
