Internet search engine Google has signed its first licence agreement to pay Italian news publishers for their content.

Reuters reports that the new deal will offer access to some of the publisher’s content on Google’s Showcase news platform.

The agreement was signed by a number of Italian publishers including  RCS Mediagroup; publishers of daily Corriere della Sera, popular sports daily Gazzetta dello Sport, the publisher of financial daily Il Sole 24 ore, Caltagirone editore, which owns Rome-based paper Il Messaggero, and Monrif, which publishes local papers such as Il Giorno and La Nazione.

Currently, 13 Italian editorial companies have sealed agreement with Google, giving Showcase news users  access to contents from 76 national and local Italian papers.

Expected to launch in Italy in coming weeks, the new deal will let Italian partnering publishers limit the access of users to paywalled stories.

This development follows heated calls by European media groups asking the world’s most popular Internet search engine to compensate publishers for content.

However, Google in October 2020 promised to pay $1-billion in the next three years to publishers globally through its Showcase news platform.

First launched in Germany, the Google news showcase currently functions in Belgium, India, and the Netherlands amongst other countries.

 “We are pleased to have reached this agreement which, by also regulating the issue of related rights, recognizes the importance of quality information and the authority of our publications,” RCS Chief Executive Urbano Cairo said.

The new deal has been predicted to pave way for the resumption of the U.S. company’s news service in Spain, shut down in 2014 over unfavourable legislation.