A "potential competitor" that has no product at all? That sounds like nonsense.

They're paying for access, not to keep Apple out of search -- otherwise they'd pay a few extra billions on top so that users on Windows can't use that potential Apple search.

Apple has been expanding its search activities for years. Google absolutely has giving Apple an incentive not to compete as part of its aims

Apple has a search bot, that, from how it interacts with the sites according to my logs, is a decade or so behind. I'm sure they could change that if they bothered, but I doubt they will.

Why isn't Google paying Microsoft billions per quarter to stop Bing? Because Bing isn't a threat, and neither would Apple Search be. What is a threat is Apple making it hard for users on iOS to use Google Search. That's what the money is for, it's the rent they pay to have their little shop in the walled garden.

Where's that Apple search engine? I've never heard of it

browser auto complete (fantastic search term to click ranking data) and “Siri Suggested Websites” when you tap the “search” button on the Home Screen.

> fantastic search term to click ranking data

Could you expand on what you mean here?

Entering a search term into the Safari URL bar will often pop up a webpage suggestion. It isn’t the first Google result. (Totally random example: try “Apache Spark tutorial.” Safari suggests a Databricks article, Google suggests something from Tutorialspoint.

What I hadn’t understood was what you meant by ranking data?