By Kim Yoo-chul
Korea’s anti-trust watchdog is looking into possible breach of various competitive laws by U.S.-based Internet giant Google.
The nation’s Fair Trade Commission (FTC) is not ruling out the possibility that it could move to block Google buying Motorola Mobility, according to officials familiar with the issue.
"The FTC has begun a deep assessment of Google’s acquisition of Motorola Mobility,’’ said an FTC spokesman, Monday.
It plans to examine whether Google’s mega deal will hurt fair competition between Korea’s leading technology companies such as Samsung Electronics and LG Electronics and cause any damage to South Korean consumers.
``The FTC will fully cooperate with anti-competition regulators of the United States, Europe and Japan for an effective investigation,’’ said a spokesman without elaborating further.
Google executives in Korea said they forecast the deal could be effective from early next year with European anti-trust regulators set to decide by January whether they will approve the proposed acquisition plan.
Google needs regulatory backing from the FTC to acquire Motorola Mobility.
Google announced the $12.5 billion deal in August, to buy the struggling U.S.-based handset maker to boost its patent portfolio against its rivals.
The Google plan looks unfavorable to Samsung Electronics and LG Electronics in terms of sentimentality as the deal was widely regarded as a manufacturing marriage, where by Google will continue to develop its Android mobile operating system (OS), while Motorola Mobility will develop hardware for its new parent company.
The world’s biggest smartphone maker Samsung Electronics is heavily dependent upon Google, using its Android OS to strengthen its smartphone business and to widen its lead against firms such as Apple.
Google Executive Vice Chairman Eric Schmidt recently told the Korean media that Google will maintain its openness of the Android OS to handset manufacturers and stressed that its close partnership with Samsung Electronics will be continued regardless of its Motorola deal.
It has concerned Korean handset makers because it could be a possible blow to their businesses.
``The FTC has still a chance to temporarily or completely block the acquisition plan because the merger will raise an unfair advantage for Google in its eco-system for smartphones,’’ said another FTC official.
Korea’s FTC said it will partner Samsung Electronics and LG.
``If Google grants its Android OS patents exclusively to the Motorola Mobility, then Samsung and LG should take Google to court, internationally,’’ said an executive from Samsung Electronics asking not to be identified as he wasn’t given the right to officially speak to the media.
All Samsung’s strategic mobile devices ― the Galaxy S, Galaxy S II, Galaxy S2 LTE, Galaxy Tablet and Galaxy Note ― are based on the Android OS.
LG Electronics’ Optimus-branded smartphone variants and Pantech’s Vega smartphone also use the Google system.
``If Google gives an order to manufacture ``reference phones’’ to Motorola Mobility from its current partner Samsung, that could be a big problem, which is intolerable,’’ said the Samsung executive.
But Google is still insisting that the acquired arm will be treated as a third-party smartphone maker, rather than a subsidiary, as a strategy to prevent conflict with its current strategic third-party smartphone partners such as Samsung, LG and HTC of Taiwan.