Business is harsh, but companies have to deal with it. This is because sometimes, rivalry means paying rivals huge amount of money.
Google and Apple aren't the best of friends because they have lots of products that compete with one another. From the mobile phone market, where Google develops Android and Apple produces iOS, to app ecosystems, to cloud services, smart assistants, and more, the two are always neck-and-neck.
But there is one thing that Google excels: having a ubiquitous search engine.
And in order to remain ubiquitous, Google has to pay a significant amount of money.
For it to remain the default search engine on iOS phones, Google paid Apple $20 billion in 2022 only.
That amount is about the same as the GDP of Lebanon in 2013, and enough money to fund a major space exploration.
It's worth noting that Google has been the default search engine on Apple devices, and that has been inked though the deal that has been renegotiated several times.
Apple and Google have worked to keep the terms of the search engine agreement under wraps during the trial and before, but it has been well known that Google is paying Apple billions per year.
Public disclosure of the documents is a big deal, because both parties have kept quiet about the exact dollar amount of the arrangement.
When asked, Apple always remained cryptic about the payment and said Google spent "billions" on a deal with Apple, with a witness later accidentally revealed Google pays 36% of the revenue it earns from search ads through Safari.
While the deal between Apple and Google began in 2002, but it took a while before the companies decided to share revenue from search ads.
And as revealed by disclosed court documents from the U.S. Department of Justice's antitrust case against Google, the price to be the default search engine on iPhones, iPads, and Macs has apparently gone up.
By paying $20 billion means that Google paid Apple at least $2 billion more than the reported price it paid Apple in 2021.
Google reportedly paid Apple around $18 billion in 2021, according to court documents.
In 2014, Google was paying $1 billion.
The deal between Google and Apple is one of the main targets of the lawsuit.
The deal between the two companies was meant to be secret, but since "the agreement with Apple is the most important of Google’s default deals," the DOJ has to have an eye and ear close to it.
Especially because it affects the market, as the DOJ believes that Google has monopolized online searches with its power (and money).
The court documents said that in search, Google and Apple seek to "work as if [they] are one company."
So here, even though Google is Apple's biggest smartphone competitor, the deal reveals a complex relationship between the two tech giants.
In 2023, Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella testified that the agreement between Apple and Google has made it impossible for search engines like Bing to compete.
Previous reports have revealed that Microsoft has tried for numerous times to negotiate with Apple to make Bing the default search engine in Safari. It even went as far as trying to sell Bing to Apple.
Apple was not interested.
Microsoft blamed Google, thinking that since Google is paying more, Apple's decision resides on where the biggest money is.
The deal is highly valuable for Apple, so much that in 2021, an analyst estimated that Google's payments to Apple made up over 14-16% of the iPhone maker's operating income.
But Apple's Eddy Cue said that Apple was concerned that Bing could not compete in "quality and capabilities." Cue claimed that Apple uses Google as the iPhone's default search engine because Apple has "always thought it was the best."
Regardless, the $20 billion deal with Apple is a key piece of evidence in the U.S.' landmark antitrust lawsuit against Google.
And following this, for again after many times, just like in any previous antitrust case against Google, Google has denied the monopoly allegations.
