Google’s AI Rivals Get Boost from Data Sharing Order
A growing wave of artificial intelligence companies could benefit from Tuesday’s antitrust ruling that compels Alphabet’s Google (GOOGL.O) to share its valuable search data with rivals. Still, experts caution that matching Google’s dominance will demand massive investment and years of effort, with no guarantee of winning users at scale.
The decision spared Google from harsher remedies, such as divesting Chrome or Android, but U.S. District Judge Amit Mehta framed the order as a step toward giving competitors who have poured billions into AI a fairer shot.
“The emergence of GenAI changed the course of this case,” Mehta wrote, noting that tens of millions now turn to generative AI chatbots like ChatGPT, Perplexity, and Claude for information once sought through traditional search. While these tools cannot yet rival Google Search, he said, the industry expects them to gain more search-like functions over time.
The ruling leaves Google’s distribution deals intact—such as paying Apple (AAPL.O) to keep its engine the default—but lowers barriers for challengers to build and scale alternatives. Some analysts argue AI rivals may ultimately pose a greater risk to Google than the antitrust case itself, though their development timelines offer Alphabet investors short-term reassurance.
So far, AI-driven search engines and browsers have barely dented Google’s market share. ChatGPT has surpassed Google’s Gemini in users, but Google has countered with features like AI Overviews and AI Mode to retain engagement.
“It takes effort for competitors to rely on the syndication and indexes that Google can provide to build a consumer-facing experience,” said Deepak Mathivanan of Cantor Fitzgerald. “And it would take longer still for consumers to embrace these new experiences.”
Indexing—the process by which Google discovers, analyzes, and stores web pages for search—remains one of its deepest advantages. Even with shared data, building a rival product would be “astronomically expensive,” said Ben Bajarin, CEO of Creative Strategies.
Nonetheless, well-funded startups are pushing forward. OpenAI already offers search within ChatGPT and is preparing to launch a web browser. Perplexity, backed by Nvidia (NVDA.O), has released its own AI-powered search and browser and is negotiating preload deals with smartphone makers.
During the trial, Alphabet CEO Sundar Pichai warned that data-sharing could allow rivals to reverse-engineer Google’s technology. Such access might help deep-pocketed giants re-enter the search race—Microsoft (MSFT.O) with Bing or even Apple, which has lagged in AI after slow progress on Siri.
Judge Mehta, however, wrote that allowing Google to keep paying partners to promote its search is “more palatable now” because both established firms and startups are attracting massive capital to build generative AI products that threaten the dominance of traditional search.