A blog about competition, regulation and privacy in the digital era
Spectrum is all around us. These invisible waves are essential for devices that communicate wirelessly. Whether using a mobile phone to make a phone call, send a text message or browse the web, the device will use spectrum to connect to a local mast and carry out your connection command. Only a finite amount of … Continue reading Vodafone/Three: a standalone decision or a potential reversal of spectrum policy?
It was reported last week that the US Federal Trade Commission has started investigating Amazon’s $1.7 billion acquisition of iRobot, the maker of Roomba smart vacuum cleaners. It seems to us that the UK and EU authorities will also have jurisdiction to investigate. Why should anyone (apart from iRobot’s shareholders) care about a large retailer … Continue reading Amazon/iRobot: The flywheel spins once more
As readers of this blog know, the UK’s Competition and Markets Authority (“CMA”) blocked its first Big Tech merger in the Meta/Giphy case. Meta duly appealed to the UK’s Competition Appeal Tribunal (“CAT”) and the CAT’s judgment was issued last week. The most discussed element of the case has been the CMA’s controversial theories of … Continue reading Meta/Giphy court judgment: The CMA’s controversial merger analysis survives, but its procedures don’t
The UK Competition and Markets Authority (“CMA”) investigation into the acquisition of Giphy by Facebook (now Meta) has been watched by merger control practitioners with morbid fascination. It has included everything one could wish for in a merger case – a Big Tech killer acquisition (arguably), novel theories of harm (arguably), satellite litigation, the highest … Continue reading CMA blocks the Facebook/Giphy merger: you can’t say they didn’t warn us