Tech giant Google made a deal with Apple in 2014 that will make Google the default search engine on all iOS devices. The deal cost Google $1 billion, but many tech analysts consider it as an excellent deal for the search giant.
In a statement acquired by Computer World, IDC analyst Will Stofega said, "Is that a steal? Given as much as Apple has captured the high end of smartphones, [iOS users] are the people with more money."
Stofega added that while iOS devices only account for a fraction of the mobile devices industry, it is a well-established brand which makes it one of the most important market in the tech industry as a whole.
According to Bloomberg, the $1 billion deal between Apple and Google was spilled during a legal argument regarding a lawsuit that involves Oracle and Google. Oracle accused Google of copyright infringement, with the former charging the search giant of using the Java scripting language in creating the Android platform.
During the hearing, an attorney representing Oracle divulged the deal between Apple and Google. The transcript was available for a limited time and was completely scrubbed from the federal court system's document database thereafter.
Apple and Google both filed motions on Jan. 20 asking the federal court to reconsider its initial decision of not sealing the transcript.
Apple's legal team claims that the information provided by the Oracle attorney are confidential as well as commercially sensitive. The legal team added that Apple does not disclose these type of information to the public and these information are disseminated on a need-to-know basis.
When the news hit the mainstream media, several tech analysts have jumped into the bandwagon. Some analysts consider the payment as sort of an incentive fee or a royalty fee for allowing Google to be the default search engine on iOS device.
Other search providers, like Bing and Yahoo, were somewhat pleased with the latest disclosure regarding the deal between Apple and Google. According to some analysts, the disclosure gave other search engines the idea of how much it will cost in order to convince Apple in replacing the default search engine on its iOS devices.