British competition authority CMA
London (dpa) – Facebook is facing headwinds from London when it comes to plans to take over the Giphy clip platform. The British antitrust authority CMA came to the conclusion in its preliminary report that the deal would weaken competition between online platforms.
Among other things, the CMA sees the danger that it could become more difficult for Facebook’s competitors to integrate the animated images from Giphy. For example, Facebook could demand that Giphy customers such as Tiktok, Twitter or Snapchat have to share more customer data in order to access the gifs, argued the CMA (Competition and Markets Authority) in a press release.
Facebook contradicted the authority’s analysis. One will continue to work with her to dispel the “wrong view” that the takeover will damage competition, said a spokesman for the technology blog “The Verge”. In May, Facebook had stated in a statement to the authority that a large proportion of users already came to Giphy via the online network.
The CMA also views Giphy as a competitor to Facebook in the online advertising market. As an example, she cites the possibility for brands such as Dunkin Donuts or Pepsi to present gifs for a fee. Before announcing the purchase, the platform considered expanding such promotional offers to include Great Britain. After the Facebook deal, the brand partnerships were stopped.
Facebook had planned to take over Giphy in February 2020. At that time, the debate was already well underway as to whether competition watchdogs should have been more restrictive on previous acquisitions by Facebook and other tech giants. The purchase of Instagram for $ 1 billion in 2012 and WhatsApp for $ 22 billion in 2014 are often cited as examples.
Facebook’s plan to take over the start-up Kustomer, which specializes in software for customer relationship management, is currently being carefully examined by competition watchdogs. The EU Commission only raised concerns about this deal at the beginning of the month.
© dpa-infocom, dpa: 210814-99-838171 / 2
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