The European Commission on Thursday adopted binding requirements under the Digital Markets Act ordering Google to open Android to rival AI assistants and to share portions of its search data with competitors — a decision that reshapes who gets to reach more than two billion Android devices.
Under the Android decision, eligible third-party AI assistants will gain voice activation and cross-app capabilities across 11 Android feature groups, subject to certification and user consent. In practical terms, Android users could eventually choose ChatGPT, Claude, Perplexity, or other assistants as deeply integrated system assistants instead of Gemini, with comparable access to device hardware and capabilities.
The second ruling focuses on Google Search data. Google must make anonymized ranking, query, click, and view data available to competing search engines and AI services on fair, reasonable, and nondiscriminatory terms. Notably, the EU explicitly included AI chatbots in the data-sharing requirement, recognizing that they effectively function as search engines in many cases.
Search data sharing begins in January 2027, with Android interoperability due by July 2027. If Google does not comply, the Commission could impose fines of up to 10 percent of its annual worldwide turnover — potentially tens of billions of dollars.
"With today's measures, we want to support innovation and diversity in the European Union, enabling fair competition in the markets of AI assistants for Android devices and search engines," said European Commission executive vice president Henna Virkkunen.
Google's president of global affairs Kent Walker pushed back sharply: "Today's decisions risk undermining vital privacy and security guardrails for millions of Europeans. We have repeatedly offered solutions to safeguard users while satisfying the DMA's goals, but these rulings discount extensive evidence of user harm."
The timing is especially damaging for Google. The company's flagship Gemini 3.5 Pro model has reportedly missed its release target for the third time this month, and Alphabet shares fell about 4% on the delay reports. Now regulators are prying open the distribution moat — default placement on Android and two decades of search behavior data — that was supposed to compensate for any model shortcomings.
The decisions may also offer an indication of how Brussels will approach similar questions involving Apple, which declined to release Siri AI in Europe explicitly citing DMA interoperability requirements as compromising user safety.
