Google Inc (NASDAQ:GOOG) could finally see the end of the antitrust probe that’s being conducted by the European Union. This morning Reuters reports that the European Commission is looking at several proposals suggested by Google Inc (NASDAQ:GOOG) that would resolve complaints that have been filed by more than 12 different companies, including Microsoft Corporation (NASDAQ:MSFT), which has already expressed dismay with the ruling handed down in the U.S. antitrust case against Google.
According to the complaints, Google Inc (NASDAQ:AAPL) was using its dominance in the search market to block its competitors. A spokesman for the European Commission said the agency expects to come to an agreement after the summer break. However that agreement depends on whether regulators, Google and its competitors can all agree on a solution.
So far neither regulators nor Google Inc (NASDAQ:GOOG) itself have revealed what those possible agreements may contain. Reuters reports that anonymous sources said the company has offered to explicitly label its own services within search results so that they are clearly set apart from those of the company’s competitors. Other possible concessions include imposing fewer restrictions on the company’s advertisers.
The antitrust probe that took place in the U.S. ended with no major action against Google Inc (NASDAQ:AAPL), which was a big victory for the search engine giant. In that case, Google only had to make two small concessions, including enabling sites to opt out of Google search and to remove some content from specialized search pages. The other concession was allowing advertisers to more easily move their ad campaigns from Google to another advertiser.
