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The
Competition and Markets Authority said it has “sufficient
information” to launch an initial probe after it sought input
earlier this year on whether the deal would stifle competition.
The CMA has until Dec. 19 to decide whether to approve the deal
or escalate its investigation.
“Google is committed to building the most open and innovative AI
ecosystem in the world," the company said. "Anthropic is free to
use multiple cloud providers and does, and we don’t demand
exclusive tech rights.”
San Francisco-based Anthropic was founded in 2021 by siblings
Dario and Daniela Amodei, who previously worked at ChatGPT maker
OpenAI. The company has focused on increasing the safety and
reliability of AI models. Google reportedly agreed last year to
make a multibillion-dollar investment in Anthropic, which has a
popular chatbot named Claude.
Anthropic said it's cooperating with the regulator and will
provide “the complete picture about Google’s investment and our
commercial collaboration."
“We are an independent company and none of our strategic
partnerships or investor relationships diminish the independence
of our corporate governance or our freedom to partner with
others,” it said in a statement.
The U.K. regulator has been scrutinizing a raft of AI deals as
investment money floods into the industry to capitalize on the
artificial intelligence boom. Last month it cleared Anthropic's
$4 billion deal with Amazon and it has also signed off on
Microsoft's deals with two other AI startups, Inflection and
Mistral.
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