CEO Pichai defends paying Apple and others to make Google default search engine

Google and Alphabet CEO Sundar Pichai arrives at the federal courthouse in Washington (Jose Luis Magana/AP)

Google chief executive Sundar Pichai has given evidence in the biggest US antitrust case in a quarter of a century, defending his company’s practice of paying Apple and other tech companies to make Google the default search engine on their devices.

Mr Pichai said the intent was to make the user experience “seamless and easy”.