by Laurie Sullivan @lauriesullivan, September 18, 2017

Google has offered to serve up rival shopping comparison sites via an auction to comply in the interim period with the $2.7 billion fine the European Union imposed on the search giant for favoring its own content in Shopping search results. Competitors can bid for spots in its Product Listing Ads.

In June, the EU fined Alphabet — Google’s parent company — billions. This interim proposal submitted to the EU would allow competitors to bid for any spot in Product Listing Ads, Reuters reports, citing people who are familiar with the deal. The proposal explains that Google would set a bottom price with its own bids minus operating costs.

Reuters reports that the proposal seems similar to a previous attempt that was unsuccessful.

EU antitrust regulators ruled that Google had abused its authority by promoting its own shopping comparison service on its own Internet property at the top of search results.

The fine follows a seven-year investigation and is the largest imposed fine for a monopoly case in the EU, according to some reports.

In July, Google reported that net income for the three-month quarter ending in June 2017 fell 28% to $3.5 billion as a result of the fine, making it the largest decline in revenue for the company since 2008.

MediaPost.com: Search Marketing Daily

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