Another victory for Google: Court rules that the company will not have to sell its AdX advertising exchange
A US court has rejected the Department of Justice's demand for Google to divest its advertising business. The company will retain control of its AdX exchange, subject only to operational adjustments.
Another victory for the tech giant: Google will not be required to sell its advertising business. This was the ruling delivered on Wednesday by the judge in the antitrust trial conducted by the US Department of Justice against the company. However, Google will be required to allow competitors in the advertising field to work with its advertising tools.
The decision was made in a lawsuit filed in 2023 by the Department of Justice and a coalition of US states, claiming that the company holds an illegal monopoly in the digital advertising market. In April 2025, the court accepted the prosecution's arguments after a three-week trial, during which it was claimed that Google holds a monopoly in the markets for ad servers for publishers and ad networks for advertisers, and that it attempted to control the market of ad exchanges that mediate between buyers and sellers.
The Department of Justice had asked the court to order Google to sell part of its advertising business. However, US District Court Judge Leonie Brinkema ruled for much more moderate remedies, which constitutes another significant victory for Google in its struggle against effective regulation. According to the decision, the company will not be required to sell its ad exchange, AdX. Instead, the court ruled for changes in its operation, as proposed by the parties, without detailing their nature.
The platform allows large publishers to sell ads in an auction process that happens automatically the moment users load a site. Advertisers pay Google a 20% commission.
This is the second significant victory for Google in its antitrust trials, coming exactly one year after a court ruled that Google would not be required to sell the Chrome browser, following a trial in which it was determined that the company is a monopoly in the search field. Instead, the company was ordered to implement measures that are primarily marginal or symbolic.
For the administration, this is the third consecutive loss in antitrust battles against tech giants, following a ruling in November where a federal court determined that Meta does not constitute a monopoly in the social media field and rejected the administration's lawsuit against it.
