LONDON — The UK’s Competition and Markets Authority said Thursday it is launching an investigation into Google’s business relationship with AI firm Anthropic.
The Competition and Markets Authority said it has “sufficient information” to open an initial investigation after it invited feedback earlier this year on whether the deal would harm competition.
The CMA has up to December 19 to either clear the deal or refer the matter to a phase two investigation.
“Google is therefore determined to foster the most open and innovative AI environment globally,” the company said.
“Anthropic is free to use multiple cloud providers and does, and we don’t demand exclusive tech rights.”
Anthropic was founded in 2021 in San Francisco by Dario and Daniela Amodei, who both formerly worked for OpenAI, the company behind ChatGPT.
The company has paid much attention to the safety and reliability of the AI models. Alphabet Inc.,
Google’s parent company, was said to have committed to investing in Anthropic last year in a deal that could be worth more than $1.5bn.
Anthropic said it is working with the regulator and will share “the whole picture of Google’s investment and our business partnership.”
“We are an independent company and none of our strategic partnerships or investor relationships in any way affect the independence of our corporate governance or our ability to engage in business with others,” it added.
The UK regulator has been examining a range of AI deals as funds pour into the sector to take advantage of the artificial intelligence craze.
It approved Anthropic’s $4 billion acquisition deal by Amazon last month and also blessed Microsoft’s deals with two other AI startups, namely Inflection and Mistral.