Google Leverages Market Power to Hike Up Prices for Maps API Access, Class Action Alleges [DISMISSED]
Last Updated on September 5, 2024
Dream Big Media, Inc. et al. v. Alphabet Inc. et al.
Filed: April 13, 2022 ◆§ 3:22-cv-02314
Google and Alphabet face a class action that alleges the tech giants have for years forced those who use their digital-mapping product APIs into a locked-in bundle of services before then hiking up the price.
September 5, 2024 – Google Maps Antitrust Lawsuit Dismissed; Plaintiffs Appeal Decision
In July 2024, a federal judge tossed the plaintiffs’ third try at the proposed class action lawsuit detailed on this page. The plaintiffs informed the court the following month that they were appealing the dismissal to the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals.
Get class action lawsuit news sent to your inbox – sign up for ClassAction.org’s free weekly newsletter here.
United States District Judge Richard Seeborg dismissed the plaintiffs’ second amended complaint in a nine-page order, ruling that their revised “tying theory” was still not legally viable. In their original and first amended complaints, the plaintiffs argued that any of Google’s Maps, Routes or Places APIs could be either the “tying” or “tied” product. Switching gears in their second amended complaint, the plaintiffs claimed that Google’s Maps APIs are the tying product, and Places and Routes APIs are the tied products, the order says.
According to the judge, however, the plaintiffs failed to sufficiently allege that Google’s terms of service prohibit customers who purchase Maps APIs from using APIs provided by competitors to provide “places” or “routes” data and functions.
“Google insists that even though the [terms of service] restrict using Google mapping content ‘with or near a non-Google Map,’ the plain language permits developers to use or display non-Google places or routes APIs with or near a Google Map,” Judge Seeborg wrote. “Thus, Google contends, there is no negative tie because its customers are perfectly free to use competitors’ versions of the allegedly tied products (routes and places APIs) with the alleged tying product (Google Maps APIs).”
Judge Seeborg ultimately dismissed the case without leave to amend on July 15, 2024. The plaintiffs’ August 12 appeal notice can be found here.
Are you owed unclaimed settlement money? Check out our class action rebates page full of open class action settlements.
December 11, 2023 – Google Mapping Technology ‘Tying’ Lawsuit Dismissed; Plaintiffs Can Try Again
The proposed class action detailed on this page was dismissed on November 30, 2023 with leave for the plaintiffs to amend the case.
Get class action lawsuit news sent to your inbox – sign up for ClassAction.org’s free weekly newsletter here.
In an eight-page order granting the defendants’ motion to dismiss the suit, U.S. District Judge Richard Seeborg found that the plaintiffs failed to allege in the antitrust suit a viable “three-way tying theory” when it comes to Google’s sale of its Maps, Routes and Places API services.
Specifically, the judge took issue with the plaintiffs’ assertion that any of the three services can be the “tying” service, with the remaining two then becoming the “tied” services.
“Because the notion [behind a tying arrangement] is the defendant is leveraging economic power it possesses in one market to attempt to acquire power it presently lacks in another market, it is unclear how a single product or service could be either the tying or the tied product/service, depending merely on which one the customer bought first,” the judge wrote.
Although the plaintiffs cited a case making the “persuasive point” that there’s “no reason a defendant could not have enough existing power in each of two markets further to restrain power in the other,” the plaintiffs also claimed that several competitors offer alternatives to each of Google’s API services that are “as good as or better in terms of performance and/or cost,” the order states.
“Those allegations would appear to undermine any argument that each service could be both tying and tied,” Judge Seeborg wrote.
Judge Seeborg gave the plaintiffs until December 30, 2023 to file an amended complaint.
Get class action lawsuit news sent to your inbox – sign up for ClassAction.org’s free weekly newsletter here
Google and parent Alphabet face a proposed class action that alleges the tech giants have for years forced those who use their digital-mapping products into a locked-in bundle of services before then hiking up the price.
The 55-page antitrust lawsuit alleges the companies have leveraged their enormous market power, “and at times monopoly power,” by improperly tying Google’s mapping products together as a means to restrain competition. The complaint contends that this “impermissible” practice harms not only computer programmers but small businesses to whom the display of location information is especially important as far as attracting and keeping customers.
The complaint charges that although some competitors offer digital-mapping APIs with comparable data and quality to those of Google, “if not better,” they have been “strangled out of competing effectively in the relevant product markets.”
“In essence, Google uses its market dominance to improperly tie together its products and lock users into what is sometimes called the Google ecosystem,” the case alleges. “There are competitors, but they have nowhere near the direct market power that Google exerts, nor nowhere near the monopoly power Google has.”
Central to the alleged “anticompetitive scheme” are Google Maps’ application programming interfaces, or APIs, which serve as the method for one computer to make use of, or “call,” the resources of another program or service, the suit says. By way of example, the case states that a programmer developing a food-delivery app or website that needs to guide drivers to customers, for instance, may call on the Google Maps API to create a digital dynamic map, or to add directions and provide navigation to a driver, and to add information about the restaurant.
Similarly, restaurants and other small businesses also rely on calling Google’s digital-mapping API to display location information, the complaint adds. Per the suit, embedding digital-mapping APIs into a website allows a customer to both locate a business without opening a separate app or web page and be sure that they are seeing the correct business.
“These are all crucial details when a customer is considering whether to patronize a small business, where even small friction can mean loss of a sale,” the case stresses.
The lawsuit says that although the costs of “calling” Google’s Maps APIs—$2 for 1,000 calls to the Maps Static API, $2 for 1,000 calls to the Maps JavaScript API, $5 for 1,000 calls to the Routes Directions API and $17 for 1,000 calls to the Places Place Details API—are small on their own, they add up quickly for small businesses and are often beyond the control of the purchaser. The suit notes that the costs small businesses pay ultimately depend on how often a user accesses or reloads a website.
Although Google for years offered a free tier for its digital-mapping APIs, the company during that time acquired potential competitors, such as Waze, the complaint says. Around May 2018, the company introduced a “pay-as-you-go” pricing plan for its core mapping APIs, reducing the number of free Maps API calls a client could make from 25,000 per day to around 930 per day, according to the case. The lawsuit says developers told the House Antitrust Subcommittee that the change amounted to a price increase of 1,400 percent.
The suit additionally alleges that Google’s terms of service prohibit customers from using any Google Maps API or component along with any API or component provided by any other digital-mapping service or provider.
“This unlawful tying and monopolistic behavior has resulted in concrete damages to app and website developers and all other direct users (or those who used them through a pass-through entity or website that passed all of the costs to them) of Google’s digital-mapping APIs, in part through anticompetitive price hikes, forcing users to purchase separate Google products,” the lawsuit alleges.
The plaintiffs, a California-based digital advertising company, a Texas-based app developer and a Pennsylvania online auto parts shop, say that their lawsuit is “not about punishing an innovative company that is reaping the rewards of its well-deserved success through large size and power,” but instead an effort to stop “a massive company” from engaging in tying and “monopolistic maintenance and exclusionary actions” with regard to certain products and services to stifle competition.
The case looks to represent all direct purchasers, app or website developers or other users of Google’s Maps APIs, Routes APIs or Places APIs who spent money or had their free-tier credits consumed more rapidly because of the “anticompetitive” allegations described here, as well as other types of users who “continue to experience anticompetitive harm” as a result of the alleged conduct.
Get class action lawsuit news sent to your inbox – sign up for ClassAction.org’s free weekly newsletter here.
Video Game Addiction Lawsuits
If your child suffers from video game addiction — including Fortnite addiction or Roblox addiction — you may be able to take legal action. Gamers 18 to 22 may also qualify.
Learn more:Video Game Addiction Lawsuit
Depo-Provera Lawsuits
Anyone who received Depo-Provera or Depo-Provera SubQ injections and has been diagnosed with meningioma, a type of brain tumor, may be able to take legal action.
Read more: Depo-Provera Lawsuit
How Do I Join a Class Action Lawsuit?
Did you know there's usually nothing you need to do to join, sign up for, or add your name to new class action lawsuits when they're initially filed?
Read more here: How Do I Join a Class Action Lawsuit?
Stay Current
Sign Up For
Our Newsletter
New cases and investigations, settlement deadlines, and news straight to your inbox.
Before commenting, please review our comment policy.