At the same time as the Microsoft investigation was announced in the UK, the US Federal Trade Commission (FTC) began investigating Amazon’s hiring of key executives, including the CEO, of AI startup Adept, and its plan to license some of Adept’s technology. And in early August, the CMA announced it was launching an investigation into Amazon’s relationship with Anthropic to determine whether it also warrants a full investigation. A CMA investigation into Google’s relationship with Anthropic is also underway.
When is a merger not a merger?
In its summary of the Microsoft-Inflection decision, the CMA said it assessed the criteria for a relevant merger situation under the Enterprise Act 2022 and noted that “there is no particular combination of assets that constitutes an enterprise. As set out in the CMA’s guidance, it may include a group of employees and their technical knowledge where this enables the continuation of a particular business activity.”
He further stated: “In addition to hiring Inflection’s former core team, Microsoft also acquired additional assets, including access to Inflection’s intellectual property. The combination of the acquisition of the core team along with these assets was key to the value of the Transaction, as it enabled the former Inflection team to continue on Inflection’s pre-Transaction roadmap for developing consumer-facing AI products within Microsoft.”