The mechanism: Google is fighting a two-front war in federal court, and both fronts touch the same wire — who gets paid to be the default, and who gets to broker the auction. In the search case, Judge Amit Mehta rejected a Chrome breakup but banned Google's exclusive default-placement contracts and ordered limited search-index and click-data sharing with rivals — remedies now under DOJ cross-appeal at the D.C. Circuit. In the ad-tech case, Judge Leonie Brinkema is weighing whether to force Google to divest its AdX exchange and open-source DFP's auction logic, after finding Google illegally tied its publisher ad server to its exchange. Neither ruling breaks Google up. But "non-exclusive" defaults and forced interoperability mean device makers and publishers get real optionality for the first time in two decades — and optionality has a bidder.
Who cashes in: