Alphabet, Google’s parent company, paid Apple $20 billion to make Google its default search engine on iPhone’s Safari browser, Bloomberg reported.
The stunning revelation was made in freshly unsealed court documents in the Justice Department’s antitrust lawsuit against Google.
The agreement between the two companies lies at the heart of a historic case, in which it is alleged that Alphabet’s Google has unlawfully monopolised the online search and related advertising market.
The US Justice Department and the search engine’s counsels will give their closing arguments on Thursday and Friday, respectively, and an order might be issued later this year.
Both tech giants did not want the payment details to come out to the public as they had been reluctant to share information related to this from the get-go.
The court document file late Tuesday was the first instance when Apple’s senior vice president of services, Eddy Cue, publicly confirmed the amount.
Payments from Alphabet mattered much to Apple as in 2020, they accounted for 17.5% of the iPhone maker’s operating income.
It was in 2002 when Apple first struck a deal with Google to use the search engine in its Safari browser for free. Later, the companies decided to share the search advertising revenue.
Court filings show that by May 2021, Google was paying Apple more than $1 billion per month.
