The ongoing antitrust trial over Google search provided an interesting new revelation this week: Google pays 36 percent of its search advertising revenue from Safari to Apple.
Bloomberg reported the number, which was shared by University of Chicago professor Kevin Murphy during his testimony in Google’s defence on Monday. It seems Murphy wasn’t supposed to share the number, with Bloomberg reporting that Google’s primary litigator, John Schmidtlein, visibly cringed when Murphy shared the number.
Google has tried to keep the number sealed and out of the public’s eye, with a recent court filing from the company calling it a “commercially sensitive part of the financial terms of an agreement currently in effect.” The filing also noted the U.S. Department of Justice didn’t want to unseal the number.
Ultimately, it seems like Murphy let the number slip while arguing that these types of agreements were normal and competitive in the search industry.
Of course, it’s no surprise that Google pays Apple. We’ve known for years that Google forks out a ton of cash to maintain its spot as the default search in Apple’s Safari web browser and on the iPhone. However, the exact figures of the companies’ revenue share agreement weren’t known before this.
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