Okay, so they spin off a bunch of shell companies holding all these offices and stop displaying them on the Google website in order to address the EU requests. But the mothership still gets to remain a single company.

Maybe a better way to think about it is that the EU can effectively demonitize them. At the worst, the EU regulators could (theoretically) block them from doing business with EU citizens. They can offer their browser for download here alright, but they can't sell any ads or any other products here.

Yes, this is how it works on the kindergarten floor.

In the real world, they have to bribe their way to the same effect.

GP here. I didn’t mean that EU should break it up. I had said “EU and other regulators” to mean the ones in the U.S. too. Other replies here have provided more substantive options that the EU could exercise to force Google to break up. I’m not saying it will be easy or quick, but it’s possible to make Google’s business more painful.

It's not a US company. Google is Irish.

Sure, it's a technicality, but Irish law still applies