Google has avoided being forced to break up its adtech business after a US judge rejected the Department of Justice’s (DoJ) push to make the technology giant sell key parts of its advertising operation.
US District Judge Leonie Brinkema ruled on Wednesday that Google’s illegal monopoly in online advertising should instead be addressed through “behavioural remedies” — restrictions on how the company operates its ad tech business.
However, the specific remedies are yet to be finalised.
The decision means Google will avoid the forced divestiture of AdX, Google’s ad exchange, as well as a proposal requiring the company to disclose the auction logic used by its publisher advertising technology.
“The behavioural remedies proposed by the parties, as modified by the Court, are adopted,” Brinkema wrote in her order.
The full opinion has been sealed for two weeks while confidential material in the evidence is redacted. A redacted version is expected to be released later this month.
The DoJ had argued that structural remedies were necessary to dismantle that monopoly, including forcing Google to sell AdX and requiring greater transparency around the auction technology that determines which ads are served to users.
Google’s position was that breaking apart its ad tech stack would harm the advertisers, publishers and small businesses that rely on its products.
“We’re very pleased the court rejected the DOJ’s proposal to break apart tools that help small businesses reach new customers and grow,” Google vice president of regulatory affairs Lee-Anne Mulholland said in a statement.
The decision is significant for the digital advertising industry, given Google’s position across the ad tech supply chain.
AdX is one of the largest marketplaces through which buyers bid for digital advertising inventory, while Google’s publisher ad server is among the most widely used technologies by publishers to manage and sell advertising on their websites.
The DoJ had argued that Google’s control across multiple parts of that chain gave it an unfair advantage and enabled the company to extract fees from publishers. The government alleged Google’s practices helped it take roughly a 20 per cent cut of publisher advertising revenue.
The news, naturally, has generated much chatter among the media buying agencies.
Ori Gold, chief executive officer of Bench Media, said the decision not to force Google to sell AdX would avoid the disruption of breaking up the company’s digital ecosystem, but would not address the underlying structural issues.
“The decision not to separate AdX avoids the disruption of breaking up Google’s digital ecosystem, but leaves the underlying problem unresolved,” he told B&T.
“Like the outcome of Google’s search case, the court found illegal monopoly conduct while leaving the structure that enabled it largely intact.
“The behavioural and operational remedies imposed by the court might improve access for other players and transparency, but they do not change the incentives within Google’s complex and vertically integrated ecosystem.”
Gold said “the real test” would be whether publishers ultimately had a genuine choice of systems, while advertisers gained greater visibility over where their media investment was going and where value was being created.
However, he said marketers should not abandon Google as a result of the ruling.
“Its technology and inventory deliver value, but no platform should be allowed to mark its own homework,” Gold said.
“Brands need independent measurement, transparent supply paths and the freedom to move investment when better outcomes exist elsewhere, without being locked into a specific ecosystem.
“Without those disciplines in place, access may create the appearance of competition rather than actual competition.”
Meanwhile, Ben Drew, managing director of growth marketing agency Chicken Dinner, pointed to what he described as an “uncomfortable reality” behind the ruling.
“Some of the same integration regulators dislike is exactly what made Google’s advertising products effective,” he told B&T.
“The challenge is separating the efficiencies created by scale from the advantages created by locking competitors out.”
Drew also suggested the biggest threat to Google’s dominance may ultimately come from technology rather than regulation.
“However, the irony is that AI may end up doing more to weaken some of Google’s historic monopolies than regulators ever could,” he said.
“The danger is that while governments spend years prosecuting the last generation of market power, the next generation of monopolies is already being formed.”
This latest ruling follows Brinkema’s decision in April 2025 that Google had “wilfully” built and maintained an illegal monopoly across two online advertising technology markets.
The court found Google had used anti-competitive practices, including preferential contracts and the integration of its various ad tech products, to maintain its dominance.
The ruling marks another major antitrust win for Google in which US courts have opted for behavioural restrictions over a forced divestiture of its major technology assets.
It follows a separate case over Google’s search business, where a US judge also found the company had operated an illegal monopoly but rejected the DoJ’s request to force Google to sell its Chrome browser and Android operating system.
Instead, the court imposed behavioural remedies, including requiring Google to share more search data with rivals and restricting exclusive distribution agreements — including the multibillion-dollar payments Google has made to companies such as Apple to remain the default search engine on their devices.
