Google Pushes for Antitrust Action Against Microsoft in UK Cloud Market

(FILES) This illustration photograph taken on October 30, 2023 in Mulhouse, eastern France, shows figurines next to a screen displaying a logo of Google, a US multinational technology company. (Photo by SEBASTIEN BOZON / AFP)
(FILES) This illustration photograph taken on October 30, 2023 in Mulhouse, eastern France, shows figurines next to a screen displaying a logo of Google, a US multinational technology company. (Photo by SEBASTIEN BOZON / AFP)
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Google Pushes for Antitrust Action Against Microsoft in UK Cloud Market

(FILES) This illustration photograph taken on October 30, 2023 in Mulhouse, eastern France, shows figurines next to a screen displaying a logo of Google, a US multinational technology company. (Photo by SEBASTIEN BOZON / AFP)
(FILES) This illustration photograph taken on October 30, 2023 in Mulhouse, eastern France, shows figurines next to a screen displaying a logo of Google, a US multinational technology company. (Photo by SEBASTIEN BOZON / AFP)

Google has called on Britain’s antitrust regulator to take action against Microsoft, claiming its business practices had left rivals at a significant disadvantage, according to a letter seen by Reuters.
Microsoft and Amazon have faced mounting scrutiny around the world over their dominance of the cloud computing industry, with regulators in Britain, the European Union, and the US probing their market power.
The CMA (Competition and Markets Authority) launched an investigation into Britain’s cloud computing industry in October, following a referral from media regulator Ofcom which highlighted Amazon and Microsoft’s dominance of the market.
In 2022, Amazon Web Services (AWS) and Microsoft's Azure had a combined 70-80% share of Britain's public cloud infrastructure services market, Ofcom said. Google’s cloud division was their closest competitor, at around 5-10%.
In a letter submitted to the CMA, Google said Microsoft’s licensing practices unfairly discouraged customers from using competitor services, even as a secondary provider alongside Azure.
“With Microsoft’s licensing restrictions in particular, UK customers are left with no economically reasonable alternative but to use Azure as their cloud services provider, even if they prefer the prices, quality, security, innovations, and features of rivals,” Google said in its letter to the CMA.
Such practices directly harmed customers, and were the only significant barrier to competition in Britain’s cloud computing market, the company said.
Microsoft last year updated its licensing rules to address such concerns and promote competition, though the changes did not satisfy rivals.
A Microsoft spokesperson said the company had worked with independent cloud providers to address concerns and provide opportunity and that more than 100 worldwide had taken advantage of the changes.
"As the latest independent data shows, competition between cloud hyperscalers remains healthy. In the second quarter of 2023 Microsoft and Google made equally small gains on AWS, which continues to remain the global market leader by a significant margin," the Microsoft spokesperson said.
Speaking to Reuters, Google Cloud Vice President Amit Zavery criticiced Microsoft’s practices, and said his company was committed to a multi-cloud approach, in which customers could easily move between providers depending on their needs.
"A lot of our software and cloud services interoperate, and can run on AWS or on Azure as well, so you're not restricted," he said. "If you don't fix this, eventually you will have fewer cloud providers, and then innovation will not really happen, and investments will start shrinking."
At issue was Microsoft's decision to update the terms for when customers wanted to use their Windows or other software licenses in the cloud, effectively resulting in higher costs if they used Google or AWS instead of Microsoft's Azure.
Asked why Amazon, which boasts a larger share of the cloud market than Microsoft, did not pose a similarly anticompetitive risk, Zavery said AWS consumers were not facing the same restrictions.
“There are some issues, in terms of cloud interoperability, but we can fix that. That's a discussion between providers, which is much understood, and customers are forcing that conversation,” he said.
“The problem we run into with Microsoft is that there's no technical issue, but you have licensing restrictions which means we are now being prevented from competing.”
Google made six recommendations to the CMA, including forcing Microsoft to improve interoperability for customers using Azure and alongside other cloud services, and banning it from withholding security updates from those that switch.
The CMA did not immediately respond to a request for comment.



Google Offers Buyouts to More Workers amid AI-driven Tech Upheaval and Antitrust Uncertainty

The new Google logo is seen in this illustration taken May 13, 2025. REUTERS/Dado Ruvic/Illustration/File Photo
The new Google logo is seen in this illustration taken May 13, 2025. REUTERS/Dado Ruvic/Illustration/File Photo
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Google Offers Buyouts to More Workers amid AI-driven Tech Upheaval and Antitrust Uncertainty

The new Google logo is seen in this illustration taken May 13, 2025. REUTERS/Dado Ruvic/Illustration/File Photo
The new Google logo is seen in this illustration taken May 13, 2025. REUTERS/Dado Ruvic/Illustration/File Photo

Google has offered buyouts to another swath of its workforce across several key divisions in a fresh round of cost cutting coming ahead of a court decision that could order a breakup of its internet empire. The Mountain View, California, company confirmed the streamlining that was reported by several news outlets, said The Associated Press.

It’s not clear how many employees are affected, but the offers were made to staff in Google's search, advertising, research and engineering units, according to The Wall Street Journal. Google employs most of the nearly 186,000 workers on the worldwide payroll of its parent company, Alphabet Inc.

“Earlier this year, some of our teams introduced a voluntary exit program with severance for US-based Googlers, and several more are now offering the program to support our important work ahead," a Google spokesperson, Courtenay Mencini, said in a statement.

“A number of teams are also asking remote employees who live near an office to return to a hybrid work schedule in order to bring folks more together in-person,” Mencini said.

Google is offering the buyouts while awaiting for a federal judge to determine its fate after its ubiquitous search engine was declared an illegal monopoly as part of nearly 5-year-old case by the US Justice Department. The company is also awaiting remedy action in another antitrust case involving its digital ad network.

US District Judge Amit Mehta is weighing a government proposal seeking to ban Google paying more than $26 billon annually to Apple and other technology companies to lock in its search engine as the go-to place for online information, require it to share data with rivals and force a sale of its popular Chrome browser. The judge is expected to rule before Labor Day, clearing the way for Google to pursue its plan to appeal last year's decision that labeled its search engine as a monopoly.

The proposed dismantling coincides with ongoing efforts by the Justice Department to force Google to part with some of the technology powering the company’s digital ad network after a federal judge ruled that its digital ad network has been improperly abusing its market power to stifle competition to the detriment of online publishers.

Like several of its peers in Big Tech, Google has been periodically reducing its headcount since 2023 as the industry began to backtrack from the hiring spree that was triggered during pandemic lockdowns that spurred feverish demand for digital services.

Google began its post-pandemic retrenchment by laying off 12,000 workers in early 2023 and since then as been trimming some divisions to help bolster its profits while ramping up its spending on artificial intelligence — a technology driving an upheaval that is starting to transform its search engine into a more conversational answer engine.