“Google evolved from a garage-based startup to a multitrillion dollar company in little more than twenty years. Much of that growth was funded by digital advertising.”

That’s how Judge Leonie Brinkema introduced Google’s history in programmatic advertising, as part of a 115-page ruling last week that found the company to be a monopolist in two ad tech product markets.

Over 18 pages, the judge detailed Google’s acquisitions and policies that, in her view, allowed Google to obtain monopoly power in publisher ad server and ad exchange markets. Here’s a breakdown, from the launch of Search to Google’s battle against header bidding:

1998-2007: Search drives advertiser demand

After launching Search in 1998, Google introduced AdWords in 2000, a platform for buying search ads, and later AdSense, that allowed publishers to place ads on their web pages.

(Google was also found to have illegally maintained a monopoly over search in a separate antitrust ruling last August.)

“By 2007, Google’s advertiser-facing AdWords and publisher-facing AdSense, which together comprised the Google Content Network, constituted the largest digital ad network in the world,” Brinkema wrote.

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 Source : https://www.thecurrent.com/data-privacy-how-google-became-an-ad-tech-monopolist