Apple lied to FCC according to just released Google documents


Back in August the FCC wanted some explanations from the parties involved regarding Apple’s rejection of the Google Voice application for the iPhone App Store. Apple tried to deflect the whole issue by telling the FCC that they hadn’t rejected the application but rather it was still under review.

At that time Google’s response was released to the press as well but in a redacted form which several portions of the document blacked out. Google’s reason for requesting this from the FCC was because in Google’s words the document contained sensitive commercial conversations between two companies. In this case it turns out those conversations were between Alan Eustace, Google Senior Vice President of Engineering and Research and Phil Schiller, Apple Senior Vice President of Worldwide Product Marketing.

The apparent switch around between the reasons for originally publishing the redacted version in August and the newly released full version of the document is apparently a result of – in Google’s words:

several individuals and organizations submitted Freedom of Information Act requests with the FCC seeking access to this information. While we could have asked the FCC to oppose those requests, in light of Apple’s decision to make its own letter fully public and in the interest of transparency, we decided to drop our request for confidentiality. Today the FCC posted the full content of our letter to their website (PDF).

As to what the real reason for Apple’s rejection according to Google’s submission to the FCC it is pretty much as everyone assumed

Apple’s representative informed Google that the Google Voice application was rejected because Apple believed the application duplicated the core dialer functionality of the iPhone. The Apple representative indicated that the company did not want applications that could potentially replace such functionality.

… In a series of in-person meetings, phone calls and emails between July 5 and July 28, 2009, Apple and Google representative discussed the approval status of the Google Voice application that was submitted on June 2, 2009. The primary points of contact between the two companies were Alan Eustace, Google Senior Vice President of Engineering and Research and Phil Schiller, Apple Senior Vice President of Worldwide Product Marketing. On July 7, Mr. Eustace and Mr. Schiller spoke over the phone. It was during this call that Mr. Schiller informed Mr. Eustace that Apple was rejecting the Google Voice application for the reasons described above.

Here is the full document from Google as submitted to the FCC

Google Filing iPhone

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