UK Investigates Microsoft After Inflection AI Deal

The UK Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) is investigating Microsoft after its acquisition of Inflection AI's key team, according to Techcrunch.

The case began four months ago when Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella founded a new consumer AI division, led by Inflection AI's founding team, including machine learning scientist Karén Simonyan and Google DeepMind co-founder Mustafa Suleyman. .

At the same time, many other members of Inflection AI, including Jordan Hoffmann - who currently heads Microsoft's AI center in London, also joined this technology group.

Image source: Stefan Wermuth/Bloomberg

The above move has raised concerns that technology "giants" are circumventing antitrust laws by "covert acquisitions" through strategic investments or recruiting talent from potential AI startups.

This is not the first time the CMA has investigated AI-related deals. In April, the CMA conducted a preliminary investigation into three AI partnerships, including Microsoft's recent investment in Mistral AI, a French startup valued at more than $2 billion. However, this deal was later removed from investigation because Microsoft's investment of less than 1% was not enough to make a significant impact on the startup.

Currently, the CMA is also reviewing Amazon's $4 billion investment in AI company Anthropic (USA) and is expected to soon open an official investigation into the close cooperation relationship between Microsoft and OpenAI. , similar to the European Commission.

In phase 1 of the investigation (lasting 40 working days, until September 11), CMA will collect evidence to determine whether the Inflection AI deal constitutes a "merger" and whether it is possible to potential harm to competition in the UK. If so, CMA will move to phase 2, with an investigation period that can last up to 6 months.

The incident once again raises alarm bells about the wave of acquisitions in the AI ​​sector, showing that regulators globally are stepping up supervision to ensure competition and fairness in the technology sector. This is full of potential.