India’s antitrust regulator has ordered an investigation into Alphabet’s Google, alleging the U.S. tech giant abused its dominant position in the country’s online market by imposing unfair terms and discriminatory practices in its popular app store.
The order came in response to complaint filed by multiple Indian app developers and industry groups, many of whom have also publicly raised concerns about what they allege is unfair practices by Google.
CCI’s allegations centre around Google’s billing system for in-app purchases and paid apps on its Play Store.
The watchdog’s decision is the latest headache for Google in India, its biggest market by users but one where it has long faced allegations of anti-competitive practices.
The U.S. giant has previously defended its Play Store policies, saying the service fee supports its investments in Android and Play Store, allowing it to provide developers with tools and a global platform to access billions of consumers around the world.
Lago, developer of an open-source billing platform, has picked up the funding across two rounds of funding it’s revealing to coincide with its official launch.
The Lago doing business today as a billing platform got its start in a very classical startup way: it had no idea that it would be a billing platform.
There are even a number of providers already pursuing an open-source approach, including FossBilling, ChargeBee, Kill Bill, AppDirect’s jBilling and the imaginatively named “Open Source Billing.” (Why beat around the bush?)
So it’s an it’s still an unsolved problem.” In Lago’s view, offering open source tools is that best solution to meet a variety of needs and ideas.
For some of those users, the open source ethos also lines up with what they are hoping to espouse themselves as businesses.
In enterprise software-as-a-service (SaaS), usage-based pricing, a pricing model in which customers are charged only when they use a product or service, is gaining ground.
According to a report from VC firm OpenView, ~60% of SaaS businesses offer some form of usage-based pricing today.
But while usage-based pricing has its advantages, it can be tougher to keep tabs on from a billing perspective.
There, he ran into blockers collecting usage-based pricing data from different providers and infrastructure and aggregating and analyzing this usage together.
“Competitors in the usage-based space only cater to the revenue teams with a closed-source, billing-first approach,” he said.
Indian firms whose apps were delisted by Google last week have begrudgingly started to comply with Play Store billing rules to get their apps back on the store.
A lot of protesting developers have opted for a consumption-only model for now, while others have opted for the Google Play billing.
And what about alternate app stores like the recently launched Indus app store from PhonePe?” Janakiraman told the publication.
Google also noted that the company has given developers three years to comply with Play Store rules.
Firms seeking regulatory actionThe firms that are protesting against Google’s move are looking for regulatory intervention.
PhonePe aims to be a top Google Play alternative in India — but it has a challenging road aheadWalmart-backed PhonePe is set to launch its Android app store this week with zero commission for in-app purchases for developers.
Later that month, a bunch of Indian startups banded together to form a coalition and explore an alternative app store.
Over the years, other startup executives have also complained about Play Store’s 30% fee and have pushed for a “Made in India” app store.
In 2021, Google dropped its commission from 30% to 15% for the first $1 million a developer earned from the Play Store each year.
If you are a developer publishing your app on alternative app stores, I’d love to hear from you on im@ivanmehta.com
Google announced today that it will pay $700 million as a part of a settlement with the U.S. Attorney General for a lawsuit over Google Play Store.
Third-party app stores and side-loadingFor at least seven years, Google will support app installs on Android outside of Google Play through different ways including third-party app stores.
Google won’t force developers to launch their apps at the same time or earlier on the Google Play for at least four years.
Plus, Google can’t stop them from displaying fees linked with Google Play or Google Play’s billing system.
OEM clausesGoogle can’t enter a deal with phone makers to have Google Play as the exclusive app store on devices to place Google Play on the home screen for at least five years.
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