It’s ‘Appropriate’ That Google Is Under Regulatory ‘Scrutiny,’ Says CEO

Google is under regulatory “scrutiny,” and “we realize, at our scale, that's appropriate,” said CEO Sundar Pichai on a Q2 call Thursday evening. “We've engaged constructively across jurisdictions.” Google “will operate based on the rules,” he said. “The scrutiny is going to be here for a while, and so we are committed to working through it.” Pichai denied in testimony Wednesday his company threatened to delist Yelp (see 2007290063). Consumers’ shift to online during the COVID-19 pandemic is “profound,” said Pichai. “We see people engaging a lot, doing newer things.” Their interests are broadening, he said. Google Meet has been “absolutely critical” during the crisis, he said. “We quickly reengineered it and made it available widely to help millions of other businesses and organizations connect and collaborate.” During the quarter, “we peaked at more than 600 million Meet participants in a single week,” he said.