The French antitrust authority has put an end to a very conspicuous complaint of French search engine Qwant against Microsoft, which accused the tech giant of anti-competitive practices and abuse of its dominant position in online search and search advertising. The verdict that came out on Thursday is a major defeat for the French company that has made a big deal about being a privacy-friendly European alternative to U.S. tech giants.
The national competition regulator, Autorité de la Concurrence of France, pointed out that Qwant failed to provide sufficient evidence to back up the most important parts of its accusations that Microsoft enforced contractual conditions that were restrictive and used its market power to block Qwant from competing. The local regulator thus not only dismissed the grievance but also denied Qwant’s request for an interim injunction that sought to have the regulator order Microsoft to cease certain practices allegedly during the investigation.
In its announcement, the authority said that Qwant “had not brought convincing elements to support its allegations,” which means that the material provided was far from meeting the legal standard necessary for the imposition of formal sanctions or emergency measures.
The decision follows a very tense period of conflict between the two companies over the dependence of Qwant on Microsoft’s Bing technology, particularly. For a long time, Qwant has been using Bing’s search index and advertising platform, which provides the results and revenue generation, a relationship that the French company sees as both indispensable and limiting.
In late October, Qwant made it public that it was expecting a rejection of its complaint and, at that time, it stated its intention of taking the matter to the French courts or national and European regulatory bodies.
On Thursday, Qwant chose not to respond immediately to offers of further commenting on the ruling, but it is slated to seek appeal routes within the next several weeks. Market experts suggest that the next move of the firm might involve lodging a complaint with the European Commission that is currently in charge of enforcing broad regulations under the Digital Markets Act (DMA) targeting large technology platforms.
Microsoft that has struggled with various antitrust issues in Europe over different products welcomed the decision. The U.S. tech group made a short announcement on Thursday, a spokesperson said:
“We are in agreement with the verdict and our commitment to offering the best search services and to innovation for consumers and partners both in France and rest of Europe remains unchanged.”
Recently, under heavy regulatory scrutiny of U.S. tech firms, the company has been highlighting its contributions to the development of the multilingual AI and European language model, thereby positioning itself as an innovation partner to the European governments and businesses.
Qwant’s lawsuit accused Microsoft of enforcing exclusivity constraints that blocked Qwant from growing independent search and advertising capabilities. The French company argued that contractual dependencies and pricing conditions not only hurt the company’s ability to develop cutting-edge technology but also the SME’s in the AI sector.
Furthermore, Qwant alleged that Microsoft engaged in self-preferencing by giving more weight to its own advertising services than partners in the process of search results and ad allocation — accusations similar to those faced by Google when antitrust proceedings were opened against it in Europe. However, after reviewing the evidence, the competition authorities have come to the conclusion that no submission made in support of the case demonstrates an urgent threat that intervention is required or sufficiently proves anticompetitive conduct under European competition law.
The ruling adds to the challenges facing Qwant as it struggles to remain competitive in a European search landscape overwhelmingly dominated by Google, with Microsoft’s Bing a distant—but growing—second. Qwant, which was once backed by the French government as a symbol of European digital sovereignty, has faced ongoing financial and technological difficulties as it tries to scale.
According to the experts, the case brings to the fore the structural issues of creating the viable European alternatives to the Big Tech services, especially in the areas that require a lot of capital such as search, AI, and advertising infrastructure.
As we know, the setback does not mean that the whole regulatory environment will be against Qwant, as the DMA will still be implemented, introducing stringent interoperability and non-discrimination obligations for the gatekeepers that are expected in 2025–26, thus, competition-agents changes in the fields of online search and advertising markets may become inevitable.
At present, however, Microsoft is still benefiting from the situation while Qwant must make up his mind whether to continue the fight via the intricately-regulated European route or to consider a different option in terms of technology and partnerships.
