FTC announces investigation into past acquisitions by large tech companies News
Free-Photos / Pixabay
FTC announces investigation into past acquisitions by large tech companies

US Federal Trade Commission (FTC) chairman Joes Simons on Tuesday announced an investigation into acquisitions made by six large technology companies. 

Alphabet (Google), Amazon, Apple, Facebook and Microsoft are the companies being investigated. They are being asked to provide documents on transactions, mostly involving acquisitions, that happened between January 2010 and December 2019.

The purpose of the investigation is to understand the process that large technology companies use when acquiring smaller companies and to see if they could potentially be in violation of federal antitrust laws. The FTC approved the investigation unanimously.

Microsoft indicated that they are willing to cooperate, but the rest of the companies had yet to respond. If any antitrust violations are found, Simons said they would be able to begin enforcement action, but that was not the goal.