The UK’s competition regulator is probing Alphabet’s investment in AI startup Anthropic. After opening public comments this summer, the Competition and Market Authority (CMA) said on Thursday it has “sufficient information” to begin an initial investigation into whether Alphabet’s reported $2.3 billion investment in the Claude AI chatbot maker harms competition in UK markets.
The CMA breaks its merger probes into two stages: a preliminary scan to determine whether there’s enough evidence to dig deeper and an optional second phase where the government gathers as much evidence as possible. After the second stage, it ultimately decides on a regulatory outcome.
The probe will formally kick off on Friday. By December 19, the CMA will choose whether to move to a phase 2 investigation.
Engadget reached out to Google and the CMA. We’ll update this story if we hear back.
TechCrunch notes that Alphabet reportedly invested $300 million in Anthropic in early 2023. Later that year
