Google has now revealed its plans to charge Chinese manufacturers for the Android apps. In a tweet from official Android account (spotted by Slashleaks), the company has noted that it “plan to charge Chinese manufacturers in the third quarter of 2019.”
After European Commission’s fine on Google in 2018, the firm was asked to stop stop illegally tying Chrome and search apps to Android. Thus, Google introduced a new paid licensing agreement for smartphones and tablets shipped into the European Economic Area in which it was said to charge hardware firms up to $40 per device to use its apps. However, it was also reported that the actual charge will vary according to country and handset size, which could be as low as $2.50.
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Now it appears that Google is further taking the paid licensing agreement for smartphones and tablets sold in China. The tweet by Android also notes that when it says about charging Chinese manufacturers in the third quarter of 2019, these “may include Huawei, ZTE, Xiaomi and many other smartphone manufacturers.”
In July 2018, the European Commission found Alphabet Inc’s Google guilty of abusing its market dominance with Android because it legally bound mobile manufacturers to pre-install its Google Search and Google Chrome on their smartphones. Google was fined a record $5 billion because of it.
Google has never charged for Android and its apps because of the revenue company gets through Google Chrome and Google Search, which were considered to be core of Android and Google services.