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OpenAI is interested in buying Chrome from Google

The Department of Justice's ongoing antitrust trial against Google took a surprise turn. The DoJ had asked Nick Turley, OpenAI's ChatGPT chief, to testify, and he confirmed that the company is willing to purchase Chrome from Google, if a court mandates the sale of the browser.

Google was found guilty of creating and maintaining an illegal monopoly in the search industry. Last year, the DoJ proposed some remedies, it wants Google to sell its Chrome browser, and its operating system, Android, to a third party to rectify the situation, and to make the market more competitive.

According to a report by Bloomberg, this is what happened in a court hearing on Tuesday. When asked if OpenAI would be interested in buying Chrome, Turley replied “Yes, we would, as would many other parties”. He also explained that OpenAI could offer a really incredible experience if ChatGPT was integrated into Chrome. The company views this as an opportunity to introduce users into what an AI first experience would look like.

Though it has partnered with Apple to distribute ChatGPT on iPhone, OpenAI has faced some issues with distributing its AI on Android smartphones. Google on the other hand has been remarkably successful, but this too was achieved via partnerships. A Google executive had acknowledged that the company had begun paying Samsung in January, as part of a 2-year agreement, to pre-install its Gemini AI app on Galaxy smartphones. OpenAI had not been successful in its own attempts to negotiate a similar deal. Google had argued that such partnerships enhanced user experiences.

Turley admitted that there are concerns that OpenAI could be shut out of the market by Google and other bigger companies who control access points that determine how people discover products, e.g. through an app store, or a browser. He also noted that user choice is restricted due to such limitations, and stated that real choice drives competition.

As the trial unfolds, experts anticipate potential shifts in multibillion-dollar market dynamics, with significant implications for how consumers interact with Google’s services. Though Google stands firm on its position of having a user-friendly ecosystem, the court's decisions in the upcoming weeks could reshape the landscape of tech competition as we know it.

Some people are concerned about the outcome. If OpenAI owns Chrome, and uses it to fuel its own AI interests, that could create a new monopoly.

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