Google's big concessions end EU antitrust probe

SAN FRANCISCO - Google made "far-reaching" concessions to settle a three year-old European antitrust investigation into alleged abuses of its dominant position in the Internet search business, authorities said on Wednesday.

Google agreed to significantly change the way it displays some search results in Europe in favor of its competitors.

Google will guarantee that whenever it promotes its own services on its web page, the services of three rivals, selected through an objective method, will also be displayed in a way that is clearly visible to users and comparable to the way in which Google displays its own services, the European Commission said.

This will apply to future search services in addition to existing ones, the Commission added in a statement.

Google also agreed to label more clearly search results stemming from its own services to allow users to distinguish between natural search results and those promoted by the company.

"We will be making significant changes to the way Google operates in Europe," Kent Walker, senior vice president and general counsel of Google, said in a statement. "We have been working with the European Commission to address issues they raised and look forward to resolving this matter."

Europe's investigation into Google has cast a shadow over the company, even as many of its businesses thrive and the company expands into new areas such as robotics, wearable gadgets and home automation. A longer antitrust probe could have produced fines of up to 10% of the Google's annual revenue, or about $5 billion.

"News of a settlement removes an important risk for Google, at least in the near- or medium-term," said Carlos Kirjner, an analyst at Bernstein Research. "Structural antitrust regulation, while unlikely, is one of the few, and perhaps the only, truly fundamental, near-existential risk Google faces in the next 10 or 15 years."

Google shares slipped 0.5% to $1,132.68 in morning trading on Wednesday.