Although he never mentioned the company by name, the spectre of Microsoft hung heavily as Google boss Eric Schmidt delivered his testimony in a Senate Judiciary hearing into anti-trust claims today.

Delivering his opening remarks, Schmidt told the hearing, ‘we get it’.

"By that I mean that we get the lessons of our corporate predecessors.

"We also get that it’s natural of you to have questions about our business.”

Google has been accused of using its dominance in the search space to favour companies it owns over rival businesses.

Schmidt used his opening remarks to discourage comparisons with Microsoft, which was the subject of lengthy anti-trust investigations in the 90s.

"Twenty years ago, a large technology firm was setting the world on fire. Its software was on nearly every computer. Its name was synonymous with innovation.”

The difference, Schmidt says, is that Google is on the internet, not on personal computers. That means if customers don’t like the service, they are just a click away from the alternative.

"I ask you to remember that not all companies are cut from the same cloth, and that one company’s past need not be another’s future.”

Image source here.