Fears of Australian big tech legislation has Google threatening to exit market while Microsoft eyes

The Australian government said that Microsoft is ready to step in if Google makes good on a threat to stop providing its internet service to the country if it's charged for once-free news content.

Google accounts for 93% of the Australian market share with DuckDuckGo and Microsoft's Bing sharing a small percentage of the competition. At a government hearing last month, a Google executive said the company would likely make its search engine unavailable in the country if the government made big tech companies pay for news content.

"Microsoft, a giant American corporation, an information technology powerhouse, is very significantly interested in the market opportunity in Australia, should Google choose to withdraw its presence in search in Australia," Australian Communications Minister Paul Fletcher told ABC News. 

Fletcher said the government won't back down from their stance even among Google's threat, saying that big tech companies "don’t always follow through" with what they say.

"What Google and Facebook say they intend to do is really a matter for them," he said. "We made it clear we very much prefer them to stay in Australia, they’re an important, significant part of the ecosystem, but ultimately these are business decisions."

Fletcher said, adding that the public policy process is very thorough and business compliance with the sovereign government's laws is required.

Microsoft requested a meeting with the prime minister, in which they discussed their interest in expanding their presence in the Australian market.

The Media Bargaining Code passed the county's lower house in December 2020 and is now being debated in a Senate committee.

With the future of the bill still unknown as well as the validity of Google's threat, Centre for Responsible Technology’s official Peter Lewis says big tech is terrified of the potential legislation, stating it would " provide a global model for addressing the impact of their market dominance of the advertising industry.”