Google Seeks To Move ‘Meritless’ Collusion Lawsuit To California

Google has asked a US judge in Texas to move an antitrust lawsuit filed in the Lone Star state to December.

In December ten US States including Texas, Arkansas, Indiana, Kentucky, Missouri, Mississippi, South Dakota, North Dakota, Utah and Idaho, had filed a lawsuit, alleging Google colluded with Facebook to break US antitrust law to bolster its online advertising business.

Google and Facebook have already reached an agreement to tackle this antitrust action by co-operating between themselves.

California move

That was Google’s third antitrust lawsuit since October, when the US Justice Department had sued Google – alleging it was abusing its market dominance to weaken rivals’ positions.

The second lawsuit (also filed in December) was filed by 38 US states led by Arizona, Colorado, Iowa, Nebraska, New York, North Carolina, Tennessee and Utah, had alleged that Google illegally maintained a monopoly in general search and search advertising via anticompetitive conduct and contracts.

But Google is seeking to move the Texas-led lawsuit to California, because that state has more relevant witnesses and documents needed by the company, Reuters reported.

Google reportedly said in a court filing that the first case alleging it monopolised online display advertising was filed in May 2020 by an advertiser, and that since then five other cases have been filed.

All were filed in the Northern District of California, “the venue where Google is headquartered and where more relevant witnesses and documents are located than in any other district in the country,” Google reportedly said in its request to move the case.

Google added that the states’ lawsuit “does not identify a single company or person who might be a witness at trial and lives or works within 100 miles” of the Texas courthouse where the case was filed.

Google has previously called the Texas lawsuit “meritless.”