"Clearly, deals such as the Facebook/WhatsApp merger should
probably not have been allowed," Isabelle de Silva said in an
interview.
"One of the things we see more clearly now than we did a few
years ago is how the ability to collect and exploit data is a
major advantage," she said.
"This is what allows players like Facebook and Google to create
their value today."
A spokesman for Facebook had no immediate comment.
With a new European Commission in place, antitrust authorities
in Brussels are preparing for an in-depth review of EU
competition rules.
One focus will be globalization and digitalization, trends that
have spurred the success of the likes of Facebook, Alphabet's
Google and Amazon.
French President Emmanuel Macron's government has been at the
forefront of European efforts to increase scrutiny and taxes on
digital platforms.
France's antitrust watchdog, which recently fined search engine
Google 150 million euros ($167 million) for opaque advertising
rules, will take part in the regulatory overhaul led by
commissioner Margrethe Vestager.
De Silva also recently created a dedicated digital unit within
the watchdog, following in the steps of the U.S. Federal Trade
Commission.
"What makes Facebook successful today is not only the fact of
having bought WhatsApp and Instagram... but also having been
able to aggregate these users' communities by merging the three
communities that were previously separate," she said.
European firms face mounting dominance by U.S. and Chinese
companies in social media, online search and e-commerce.
But de Silva said she was not calling for a break-up of
America's biggest technology companies.
Instead, she said there was a need for tougher controls over
large tech companies eating up innovative startups.
"Being dominant is not in itself illegal," de Silva said. "I
find it questionable that an already dominant company can
acquire all the companies in its ecosystem and that no rival can
emerge."
(Reporting by Mathieu Rosemain; editing by Jason Neely)
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