Sundar Pichai, CEO of Google, on Monday acknowledged the importance of being the default search engine in keeping users glued to the company's products -- a key point in a once-in-a generation antitrust fight with the U.S. government focused on the billions of dollars Google paid to be the default on laptops and smartphones.
Pichai, who was called by Google, testified in a trial that will determine whether Google acted illegally to maintain its dominance of online search and parts of search advertising. If the government wins, the company may be forced to scrap some business practices that have helped it stay on top.
In testimony Monday morning, Pichai was shown instances where Google pressed Apple, wireless companies and smartphone makers which use Google's Android operating system to be made the default for their devices in exchange for billions of dollars in payments.
"We're paying for defaults. That's correct. We pay for preload exclusivity on a device-by-device basis," Pichai said under questioning from the Justice Department.
A lawyer for the Justice Department asked Pichai about a 2007 discussion of Google executives, which included Pichai before he became chief executive, about an Apple request to let users choose their search engine on a new version of its browser Safari.
A document at the time noted that 75% of people do not change defaults, and noted: "Defaults have strong impact."
Also Monday, Pichai took a couple of swipes at its tech rival Microsoft (MSFT.O) browser, maker of Internet Explorer.
Before Google launched its Chrome browser, which competes with the Microsoft product, Pichai said, "The browser market at the time had kind of stagnated.
"They (Microsoft) were not that incented to improve the browser," he added, calling Chrome a "pretty dramatic improvement" when it was launched in 2008.
The clout in search makes Google a heavy hitter in the lucrative advertising market, its biggest revenue source.
Google has also argued that if people are dissatisfied with default search engines, they can, and do, switch to another search provider. It has also argued the revenue share agreements are legal and that it has invested heavily to keep its search and advertising businesses competitive.
