Fortnite maker Epic Games has reached a “comprehensive settlement” with Google that could end its five-year legal crusade targeting Google’s Play Store for Android apps, both companies revealed in a joint legal filing.
Epic CEO Tim Sweeney called the settlement an “awesome proposal” in a social media post.
Google and Epic Games said the settlement “would allow the parties to put their disputes aside while making Android a more vibrant and competitive platform for users and developers,” according to the document, filed in a San Francisco federal court Tuesday.
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Epic, which makes the hit online game Fortnite, won a victory over Google in the summer when a federal appeals court upheld a jury verdict condemning the Android app store as an illegal monopoly. The unanimous ruling cleared the way for a federal judge to enforce a potentially disruptive shake-up that’s designed to give consumers more choices.
The specific terms of the settlement agreement remain under seal and must be approved by US district judge James Donato, but the two companies broadly outlined some of their agreements in their joint filing. A hearing is set for Thursday.
They said the settlement closely follows Donato’s October 2024 ruling ordering Google to tear down the digital walls shielding its Android app store from competition. That included a provision that will require its app store to distribute rival third-party app stores so consumers can download them to their phones, if they so desire.
Google had hoped to void those changes with an appeal, but the ruling issued in July by the ninth circuit court of appeals delivered a legal blow for the tech company, which has been waylaid in three separate antitrust trials affecting different pillars of its internet empire.
Epic Games filed lawsuits targeting Google’s Play Store as well as Apple’s iPhone App Store in 2020 in an attempt to bypass exclusive payment processing systems that charged 15% to 30% commissions on in-app transactions. The settlement agreement proposed Tuesday calls for Google to limit those payments to between 9% and 20%, depending on the transaction.
