French Competition Watchdog Hits Google with 250 Mln Euro Fine 

The Google logo is seen on the Google house at CES 2024, an annual consumer electronics trade show, in Las Vegas, Nevada, US January 10, 2024. (Reuters)
The Google logo is seen on the Google house at CES 2024, an annual consumer electronics trade show, in Las Vegas, Nevada, US January 10, 2024. (Reuters)
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French Competition Watchdog Hits Google with 250 Mln Euro Fine 

The Google logo is seen on the Google house at CES 2024, an annual consumer electronics trade show, in Las Vegas, Nevada, US January 10, 2024. (Reuters)
The Google logo is seen on the Google house at CES 2024, an annual consumer electronics trade show, in Las Vegas, Nevada, US January 10, 2024. (Reuters)

France's competition watchdog on Wednesday said it fined Google 250 million euros ($271.73 million) for breaches linked to EU intellectual property rules in its relationship with media publishers.

Google has pledged not to contest the facts as part of settlement proceedings, the watchdog said, adding the company also proposed a series of remedy measures to certain shortcomings.

The fine is linked to a copyright dispute in France over online content in a case triggered by complaints from some of France's biggest news organizations, including Agence France Presse (AFP).

The dispute seemed resolved in 2022 when the US tech giant dropped its appeal against an initial 500 million euro fine issued at the end of a major investigation carried out by the Autorite de la Concurrence.

In Wednesday's statement, the watchdog said Google violated the terms of four out of seven commitments agreed in the settlement agreement, including conducting negotiations with publishers in good faith and providing transparent information.

Google could not immediately be reached for comment.



OpenAI Enters Google-Dominated Search Market with SearchGPT 

OpenAI logo is seen in this illustration taken May 20, 2024. (Reuters)
OpenAI logo is seen in this illustration taken May 20, 2024. (Reuters)
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OpenAI Enters Google-Dominated Search Market with SearchGPT 

OpenAI logo is seen in this illustration taken May 20, 2024. (Reuters)
OpenAI logo is seen in this illustration taken May 20, 2024. (Reuters)

OpenAI is venturing into a territory long dominated by Google with the selective launch of SearchGPT, an artificial intelligence-powered search engine with real-time access to information from the internet.

The move, announced on Thursday, also places the AI giant in competition with its largest backer Microsoft's Bing search and emerging services such as Perplexity — a search-focused AI chatbot firm backed by Amazon founder Jeff Bezos and semiconductor giant Nvidia.

Shares of Google's parent company Alphabet ended 3% lower on Thursday after OpenAI's announcement.

OpenAI said it has opened sign-ups for the new tool, which is currently in the prototype stage and is being tested with a small group of users and publishers. The company plans to integrate the best features from the search tool into ChatGPT in the future.

"AI-powered search tools from OpenAI and Perplexity re-affirm search as a content engagement model but pressure Google to be better at its own game," Canaccord Genuity analyst Kingsley Crane said.

Google dominates the search engine market with a 91.1% share as of June, according to web analytics firm Statcounter.

SearchGPT will provide summarized search results with source links in response to user queries, OpenAI said in a blog post. Users will also be able to ask follow-up questions and receive contextual responses.

The company will give publishers access to tools for managing how their content appears in SearchGPT results. News Corp and The Atlantic are publishing partners for SearchGPT.

SearchGPT signals a closer collaboration between publishers and OpenAI, following content licensing agreements with major organizations like Associated Press, News Corp and Axel Springer.

"Newer AI-powered search providers could face challenges of their own, with Perplexity already facing pending legal action from publishers like Wired and Forbes, and Condé Nast," said Crane.

Major search engines have been trying to integrate AI into search since ChatGPT first launched in November 2022. Microsoft, through its early investment, adopted OpenAI technology for its Bing search engine, while Google rolled out AI-powered summaries for the wider public at its developer conference in May.

Google did not respond to a Reuters query on the potential impact of SearchGPT on its business.

Reuters had earlier reported on OpenAI's plans around AI search in May.