Associated Newspapers Ltd. and wholly owned United States subsidiary Mail Media Inc., the publishers of the online newspaper “Daily Mail,” have sued Google LLC for allegedly using its dominance to control and limit the revenue stream upon which the news outlet relies: online advertising. Tuesday’s complaint brought three federal antitrust claims for monopolizing the market for publisher ad servers and ad exchanges, a New York unfair business practices claim, and a common law fraud claim.
Daily Mail explains that it began as a print newspaper in London more than a century ago. In 2003, it reportedly introduced an online version and in 2011 opened its New York City headquarters. According to the filing, it employs hundreds of reporters and editors, as well as ad-tech, operations, and ad-sales teams in the U.S.
The filing contended that while online advertising continually grows as users eat up more internet content, newspapers’ advertising revenue has declined by 70% over the last decade, resulting in layoffs and closures. The thrust of the complaint is that news publishers like the Daily Mail do not see the growing ad spend because Google monopolizes the tools that publishers and advertisers use to buy and sell online ad space, including ad sales software. Similarly problematic, Daily Mail asserted, is that Google “operates the dominant exchange where millions of ad impressions are sold in auctions every day.”
According to the complaint, Google also controls the “shelf space” on publishers’ pages where ads appear and exploits that control to defeat competition. Too, Google reportedly makes it difficult for publishers to compare exchange prices, limits the number of exchanges that can submit bids, and uses bids offered by competing exchanges to scale its own bids in “a de facto bid rigging scheme.” The complaint further claimed that for years, Google has used its search rankings to punish publishers that do not yield to its practices.
The complaint follows on the heels of another filed by four publishers in the Eastern District of Wisconsin. A smattering of other lawsuits, including one filed by an online publisher last December for monopolization of the ad publisher server market, and the suit filed by state attorneys general concerning the market for online advertising, accused Google of employing similar tactics to stifle competition and reap massive profits.
The plaintiffs are represented by Kellogg, Hansen, Todd, Figel & Frederick PLLC, the same firm defending Facebook in the FTC’s divestiture suit, now proceeding through dismissal briefing.
