European Commission Approves Microsoft Acquisition of LinkedIn Subject to Conditions* On 6 December 2016, the European Commission cleared the acquisition of LinkedIn by Microsoft, subject to Microsoft granting LinkedIn’s competitors access to certain LinkedIn tools. “Big Data” concerns analysed and dismissed The acquisition of LinkedIn’s “data” was one of the most anticipated issues in the case. Following Facebook/WhatsApp and Google/Doubleclick, Competition Commissioner Vestager highlighted the problem of “big data” in a 2016 speech, noting that “The problem for competition isn’t just that one company holds a lot of data. The problem comes if that data is really unique, and can’t be duplicated by anyone else.” As an overall matter, Microsoft’s and LinkedIn’s activities
The EU Commission conditionally clears a merger in the professional social network market (Microsoft / LinkedIn)
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