On December 13, britain's antitrust regulator, the Competition and Markets Authority (CMA), said it would investigate Microsoft's acquisition of Nuance, an artificial intelligence and voice technology company.
The CMA is considering whether the deal will result in a significant reduction in competition for goods or services within any one or more markets in the UK.
On April 12 of this year, Microsoft announced the acquisition of Nuance for $19.7 billion to strengthen Microsoft's presence in the healthcare vertical. The deal is Microsoft's second-largest acquisition ever, after microsoft's $26.2 billion payment for LinkedIn in 2016.
Nuance has developed many products in the healthcare field that support clinical medical treatment, such as technology for recording telemedicine visits, speech recognition tools for clinical records, radiology reports based on artificial intelligence, and other software tools.
The deal has been approved by regulators in the United States and Australia, and Microsoft is not required to provide any remedies. At the same time, it is reported that the European Union also plans to formally approve the transaction in the near future.
However, at present, the CMA has not specified a specific time frame for this case, and the CMA's external consultation time will last until January 10, 2022.
It is important to note that antitrust investigations into the proposed acquisition could last for months, leading to delays in clearing transactions. During the investigation, if the CMA has competitive concerns, it can require Microsoft to take remedial action to proceed with the transaction or even block the merger.
Tech giants' interest in healthcare has been growing vertically in recent years, with Amazon, Apple, Google, Microsoft, and even Facebook all interested in developing tracking, monitoring, or other health support tools. There are fears that the tech giants' ambitions in this space will further consolidate their dominance and market power.
Meanwhile, the UK is tweaking domestic competition laws to protect smaller innovators from tech giants.
It is worth mentioning that on November 30, the CMA ruled to terminate the acquisition of Giphy by Facebook's parent company Meta.
Stuart McIntosh, chairman of the CMA's independent investigative team, believes that the collaboration between Facebook and Giphy has eliminated potential competitors in the online advertising market. If it doesn't act, Facebook will also further enhance its market presence in social media by controlling competitors' access to Giphy.
"By asking Facebook to sell Giphy, we are protecting millions of social media users and promoting competition and innovation in digital advertising." Stuart McIntosh said.
Synthesis/Compilation: Nandu reporter Huang Liling