Microsoft says Google is running ‘shadow campaigns’ in Europe to influence regulators
Google CEO Sundar Pichai and Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella
Udit Kulshrestha and David Paul Morris | Bloomberg | Getty Images
Microsoft took the unusual step Monday of publicly accusing longtime rival Google of running “shadow campaigns” in Europe designed to discredit the software giant with regulators.
Microsoft lawyer Rima Alaily wrote in a blog post that Google hired a firm to recruit European cloud companies to represent the search company’s case.
“This week an astroturf group organized by Google is launching,” Microsoft lawyer Rima Alaily wrote. “It is designed to discredit Microsoft with competition authorities, and policymakers and mislead the public. Google has gone through great lengths to obfuscate its involvement, funding, and control, most notably by recruiting a handful of European cloud providers, to serve as the public face of the new organization.”
The conflict represents a fresh fight between two companies that do battle in cloud infrastructure as well as online advertising and productivity software.
Google faces heightened regulatory pressure in Europe and in the U.S., where it’s in the midst of its second antitrust trial in a case brought by the Justice Department.
Alaily suggested in Monday’s post that Google hired advisory firm DGA Group to set up the Open Cloud Coalition. One company that opted not to participate in the group told Microsoft that the coalition would receive financial backing from Google and criticize Microsoft’s practices in Europe, Alaily wrote.
Alaily linked to a flyer for the Open Cloud Coalition. The overview in the attached document says the consortium was “being formed to advocate for a fair, competitive and open cloud services industry across the UK and EU.”
DGA Group representatives didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment.
“We’ve been very public about our concerns with Microsoft’s cloud licensing,” a Google cloud spokesperson said in an email. “We and many others believe that Microsoft’s anticompetitive practices lock-in customers and create negative downstream effects that impact cybersecurity, innovation, and choice.”
In September, Google said it was filing a complaint against Microsoft with the EU’s executive body, the European Commission, over what Google considers unfair practices for licensing the Windows Server operating system. Microsoft says on its website that clients can save an average of 36% when they use Windows Server on Microsoft’s cloud instead of on Amazon Web Services.
Amazon leads the cloud infrastructure market over Microsoft and Google.
Alaily said Google has established a pattern of going after Microsoft. Google funded the Coalition for Fair Software Licensing that in 2023 asked the U.S. Federal Trade Commission to investigate Microsoft, Alaily wrote. And she said Google reportedly offered around $500 million to members of another group, Cloud Infrastructure Services Providers in Europe, if they would reject a proposed antitrust settlement regarding Microsoft. The case was ultimately settled in July.
WATCH: Google Cloud exec says Microsoft is in violation of EU antitrust laws
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OpenAI CEO Sam Altman speaks during the Snowflake Summit in San Francisco on June 2, 2025.
Justin Sullivan | Getty Images News | Getty Images
OpenAI has been awarded a $200 million contract to provide the U.S. Defense Department with artificial intelligence tools.
The department announced the one-year contract on Monday, months after OpenAI said it would collaborate with defense technology startup Anduril to deploy advanced AI systems for “national security missions.”
“Under this award, the performer will develop prototype frontier AI capabilities to address critical national security challenges in both warfighting and enterprise domains,” the Defense Department said. It’s the first contract with OpenAI listed on the Department of Defense’s website.
Anduril received a $100 million defense contract in December. Weeks earlier, OpenAI rival Anthropic said it would work with Palantir and Amazon to supply its AI models to U.S. defense and intelligence agencies.
Sam Altman, OpenAI’s co-founder and CEO, said in a discussion with OpenAI board member and former National Security Agency leader Paul Nakasone at a Vanderbilt University event in April that “we have to and are proud to and really want to engage in national security areas.”
OpenAI did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
The Defense Department specified that the contract is with OpenAI Public Sector LLC, and that the work will mostly occur in the National Capital Region, which encompasses Washington, D.C., and several nearby counties in Maryland and Virginia.
Meanwhile, OpenAI is working to build additional computing power in the U.S. In January, Altman appeared alongside President Donald Trump at the White House to announce the $500 billion Stargate project to build AI infrastructure in the U.S.
The new contract will represent a small portion of revenue at OpenAI, which is generating over $10 billion in annualized sales. In March, the company announced a $40 billion financing round at a $300 billion valuation.
In April, Microsoft, which supplies cloud infrastructure to OpenAI, said the U.S. Defense Information Systems Agency has authorized the use of the Azure OpenAI service with secret classified information.
A United Launch Alliance Atlas V rocket is shown on its launch pad carrying Amazon’s Project Kuiper internet network satellites as the vehicle is prepared for launch at the Cape Canaveral Space Force Station in Cape Canaveral, Florida, U.S., April 28, 2025.
Steve Nesius | Reuters
United Launch Alliance on Monday was forced to delay the second flight carrying a batch of Amazon‘s Project Kuiper internet satellites because of a problem with the rocket booster.
With roughly 30 minutes left in the countdown, ULA announced it was scrubbing the launch due to an issue with “an elevated purge temperature” within its Atlas V rocket’s booster engine. The company said it will provide a new launch date at a later point.
“Possible issue with a GN2 purge line that cannot be resolved inside the count,” ULA CEO Tory Bruno said in a post on Bluesky. “We will need to stand down for today. We’ll sort it and be back.”
The launch from Florida’s Space Coast had been set for last Friday, but was rescheduled to Monday at 1:25 p.m. ET due to inclement weather.
Amazon in April successfully sent up 27 Kuiper internet satellites into low Earth orbit, a region of space that’s within 1,200 miles of the Earth’s surface. The second voyage will send “another 27 satellites into orbit, bringing our total constellation size to 54 satellites,” Amazon said in a blog post.
Kuiper is the latest entrant in the burgeoning satellite internet industry, which aims to beam high-speed internet to the ground from orbit. The industry is currently dominated by Elon Musk’s Space X, which operates Starlink. Other competitors include SoftBank-backed OneWeb and Viasat.
Amazon is targeting a constellation of more than 3,000 satellites. The company has to meet a Federal Communications Commission deadline to launch half of its total constellation, or 1,618 satellites, by July 2026.
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