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Comment by redm | Hacker News Reader

In reference to the default search engine partnership between Google and Apple:

"Though Google and Apple have been tight-lipped on how much their deal is worth, the lawsuit projects that it accounts for between 15% and 20% of Apple’s annual profits.

That means Google pays as much as $11 billion, or roughly one-third of Alphabet’s annual profits, to Apple for pole position on the iPhone. In return, Apple-originated search traffic adds up to half of Google search volume, the government says. Google declined to comment on that statistic, and representatives said they weren’t aware of the “Code Red” language included in the lawsuit." [1]

Thats a lot of revenue and if they clouded, this case may have legs.

[1] https://www.wsj.com/articles/googles-exclusive-search-deals-...

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> Apple-originated search traffic adds up to half of Google search volume, the government says.

That doesn't seem plausible. It seems like it ought to be more like 10-20% of search volume going by market share. Unless Apple users are for some reason doing more searches than Android and Windows users.

I could see how maybe ad revenue from Apple users is disproportional to their market share because they're generally wealthier.

Maybe they're referring to US traffic only for some reason? The iPhone has something like 50% market share in the US.

Of course only US traffic counts and that "some reason" would be because their jurisdiction is only the US.

Wow, I didn't realize their market share was that large.

It's one of 4 trillion dollar market-cap US companies. Of course it's going to have significant market share as a result.

> Unless Apple users are for some reason doing more searches than Android and Windows users.

And also clicking on the ads, no?

It's also possible they're referring to revenue. It's expected that users who buy accessible-luxury phones are worth more to advertisers and marketers.

I'd expect iOS devices to also last longer than cheap Android phones. That means that iOS usage share should be substantially higher than its market share

Your theory makes sense if people buy only one phone in their life time.

You can actually look up device numbers. I did and was surprised. Apple 1.5 billion, android 2.5 billion, in 2019.

The comparison is a little murky because both stats include everything: watches, speakers, etc. But at least 900 million iphones were active.

https://www.theverge.com/2019/1/29/18202736/apple-devices-io...

https://www.androidpolice.com/2019/05/07/there-are-now-more-...

Not sure how that follows. If iPhones last twice as long as Android phones, then for every iPhone sale to one user there are two Android sales to one user. Thus in any given year, there are twice as many iPhone users as the market share of phones sold in that year would indicate.

Desktop browsers on Macs also report as 'Apple' devices.

Google earn more per 1000 searches than Bing by quite a margin (I believe there is a stat for this in the UK CMA report).

Google can offer an amount greater that any other search engine would find profitable. If I remember correctly, Google earn around double per 1000 searches than Bing does. Other English based indexes tend to use Bing ads and earn even less per 1000 searches.

I suspect the amount Google offers is an amount that is deliberately at a level that Bing would not be able to match.

As comparison: "The new search deal will ensure Google remains the default search engine provider inside the Firefox browser until 2023 at an estimated price tag of around $400 million to $450 million per year." https://www.zdnet.com/article/sources-mozilla-extends-its-go...

And now we see why Android exists, and how immensely valuable it is to Google.

I still dont understand what is wrong with that deal?

Apple has the option to go to Bing and the user has the option to change the default search engine.

I do think it's a lot better than the situation on Android phones. At least changing the default search engine is relatively easy on iOS (I've changed all my personal devices over to duckduckgo).

I want to have my own choice of search engine than Google/Yahoo/Bing/DuckDuckGo. I can't on iOS, I must choose from the 4 options and cannot supply my own.

Specifically: I want to use Yandex as an Australian.

Workaround: set search engine to DDG, then use !ya to search via Yandex.

It is a feedback cycle that has a negative effect on all consumers, not just the consumers that would use a different search engibne.

The feedback works like this: 1. Google is dominant and can outbid competitors. 2. Many (most?) users will not change default search provider so long as it is basically functional. 3. Google's competitors will only attract a minority of customers that realize they can change and decide to. 4. Google stays dominant and competition is stifled and with it any improvements.

As a user of alternate search engines, I am hurt because if 2 did not occur and people that did not care were distributed evenly then my search provider would have more revenue and would presumably hire more engineers to improve the service. Another competitor cannot capture that revenue from 2 simply because Google can always outbid them because of their dominance.

Of course, there are some number of people who would switch to Google if the default was Bing, but is it significantly different than the people switching now?

> Google is dominant and can outbid competitors

But Google is not the only dominant player, MS, Facebook, Amazon even Apple have the resources to make their own search engine and can pay others so that their search engine is the default one.

In this case MS can pay Apple to make Bing as the default.

Can you imagine the reaction to a default Facebook search on iPhones? Users would abandon them in droves.

Bit of a side question: how can deals be tight lipped in a publicly listed company? Can shareholders vote to make information public? Or is it just not common

The CEO is beholden to the board who are beholden to the shareholders. The CEO is generally not actually beholden to the shareholders (directly). Depending on the shares, the shareholders may or may not be able to actually influence the board.

Owning a share in coca cola doesn't give you a right to the secret formula.

Yes but the majority of shareholders do not vote against the business.

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