Google, Apple Deny Search Engine Collusion Allegations in Court

Apple Inc. and Google Inc. urged a California judge to reject claims stemming from a private antitrust case accusing the tech titans of an unlawful deal that thwarted competition in the search advertising market.

Judge P. Casey Pitts of the US District Court for the Northern District of California at a Thursday hearing asked whether he could infer the existence of an unlawful deal inked in 2005 in which Apple allegedly agreed to refrain from competing with Google in the search ad business in exchange for billions of dollars in profits. The plaintiff, California Crane School Inc., alleged in a ...