Why vocal for local won’t bother Google

BENGALURU/NEW DELHI :For several years, regulators, politicians, entrepreneurs and venture capitalists across the world have been whining about the seemingly limitless power wielded by America’s Big Tech, chiefly, Amazon, Apple, Facebook, Google and Microsoft. These companies have made a range of allegations against the American search giant: Google’s Play Store is exploiting its dominant position and enforcing unfair policies that punish local startups; Google makes too much money through advertising; and, Google’s power is a threat to India’s startup ecosystem. Some of these companies called for the creation of an “Indian" app store as a rival to the Play Store and Apple’s App Store. Ideally, the dispute between the app developers and Google should be resolved through dialogue, but if that doesn’t work, developers would have no choice but to approach the government and regulators including the Competition Commission of India for help, according to Rameesh Kailasam, CEO of IndiaTech.org, a lobby group for Indian startups. Last week, a group of 15 companies including representatives of Paytm, Matromony.com and Goqi held talks with CCI officials to complain about Google’s policies, chiefly, the proposed imposition of the 30% commission.