Microsoft the Legal Precedent, Microsoft the … Victim? (Premium)

While the parallels between US v. Google and US v. Microsoft are obvious, it's fascinating how often the software giant comes up in this week's antitrust ruling against the online giant: The terms Microsoft and Bing appear in this 286-page document over almost 500 times, collectively. But even more fascinating is why: While many of the Microsoft references serve to compare Google's anticompetitive business practices today with Microsoft's in the late 1990s, many others are there to paint the software giant in an entirely different light, as a victim. And not just a victim, but perhaps the company that Google's illegal behavior has victimized the most.

Do not shed any tears for this company.

With a market cap of over $3 trillion and coming off a historically strong fiscal year, despite its incredible spending over $100 billion during that time building out its AI infrastructure and acquiring Activision Blizzard, Microsoft's going to be just fine, thank you very much. And if I'm reading this ruling correctly, it's about to get even better. In an ironic twist, Microsoft will likely emerge as the biggest winner in the Google case.
What happened
First, a quick recap: Yesterday, Judge Amit Mehta delivered a brutal takedown of Google and its illegal online search monopoly in the form of a ruling that's been widely praised by legal experts for its fairness and completeness. That Google has a monopoly in search is patently obvious: Google Search controlled roughly 90 percent of the online search market by 2020, and almost 95 percent on mobile. Its closest competitor, Microsoft Bing, controlled just 6 percent of that market, while Yahoo and DuckDuckGo are also-rans with barely 2 percent share.

Everyone knows that monopolies aren't inherently illegal. But because Google engaged in "efforts to maintain this position through means other than competition on the merits," just as Apple has in a similar antitrust case that's unfolding in parallel, its monopoly is illegal. And Google, now legally a monopolist, will face punishments that will include feeds, behavioral changes, and, possibly, even the divestiture of the advertising business that lies at the heart of its business empire. Those punishments will be determined at a future hearing, and Google, of course, will appeal the ruling regardless. So it could be several months or even a few years before this is fully resolved.

This is all pretty obvious, but I want to again raise an important point about antitrust that many seem to misunderstand. I call this the antitrust paradox. Whether it's Microsoft in the late 1990s, Apple or Google today, or any other monopolist, there are always two sides to the story that are (or can be) both true, seem contrary, but are, in fact, not mutually exclusive. That is, Microsoft made the argument that its bundling of Internet Explorer with Windows benefitted consumers, while the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) alleged that this bundling was illegal because...