Summarize this content to 2000 words in 6 paragraphs in Arabic Unlock the Editor\u2019s Digest for freeRoula Khalaf, Editor of the FT, selects her favourite stories in this weekly newsletter.Microsoft\u2019s $13bn investment in OpenAI has been cleared by the UK\u2019s competition regulator, weeks after the artificial intelligence start-up struck a new partnership with SoftBank that reduces its reliance on the US big tech company for its computing infrastructure. The Competition and Markets Authority on Wednesday said the deal did not qualify for a more formal investigation into whether the partnership was a merger between the two companies. It determined that there had not been any \u201cchange of control\u201d that gave Microsoft \u201cde facto control over OpenAI\u201d. The regulator added that \u201crecent developments in the partnership which reduce OpenAI\u2019s reliance on Microsoft for compute\u201d \u2014 an apparent reference to OpenAI and SoftBank\u2019s new $100bn AI infrastructure project Stargate \u2014 \u201cparticularly\u201d contributed to its decision. However, Joel Bamford, the CMA\u2019s executive director for mergers, said the decision \u201cshould not be read as the partnership being given a clean bill of health on potential competition concerns\u201d. The CMA\u2019s decision noted that Microsoft still exerted a \u201chigh level of material influence\u201d over OpenAI\u2019s commercial policy. The announcement comes as the CMA has faced intense scrutiny in recent months from the government to show it is promoting growth and not stifling innovation in the UK. Ministers abruptly ousted the agency\u2019s chair Marcus Bokkerink last month, replacing him with the former head of Amazon UK, Doug Gurr.The CMA announced in December 2023 that it was gathering information about whether to launch a formal investigation into the Microsoft deal, and was followed by a similar probe by the EU. Last June, the EU cleared the tie-up under its merger control rules. However, Margrethe Vestager, the bloc\u2019s then competition chief, warned at the time that the \u201cstory is not over\u201d as the EU examined other aspects of the two companies\u2019 relationships, in what was seen as a potential prelude to an antitrust probe. In a market study from January 2025, the Federal Trade Commission said deals such as Microsoft\u2019s and OpenAI\u2019s raised antitrust concerns.\u201c[P]artnerships by big tech firms can create lock-in, deprive start-ups of key AI inputs, and reveal sensitive information that can undermine fair competition,\u201d former FTC chair Lina Khan said then. Microsoft is the largest investor in OpenAI, having backed the company with more than $13bn. The original deal granted Microsoft an exclusive licence to OpenAI\u2019s AI research in return for Microsoft offering OpenAI the supercomputing resources it needs to build powerful AI models. But the companies\u2019 relationship has become more strained over the past 18 months, with both reducing their reliance on each other for AI systems and the costly infrastructure that powers them. The CMA was the first regulator to look into Microsoft\u2019s ties to OpenAI after the start-up\u2019s board ousted chief executive Sam Altman in November 2023 only to rehire him a few days later. Microsoft, which had pushed for Altman\u2019s return to the helm of the company, ended up taking a non-voting observer seat on OpenAI\u2019s board following the incident. The CMA said it was initially concerned the partnership could give Microsoft control over OpenAI\u2019s business. Following regulator scrutiny, Microsoft also gave up its observer seat on OpenAI\u2019s board in 2024. \u201cOur OpenAI partnership and its continued evolution promote competition, innovation, and responsible AI development, and we welcome the CMA\u2019s conclusion, after careful and prudent consideration of the commercial realities, to close its investigation,\u201d said Microsoft. OpenAI said it \u201coperates in a highly competitive and rapidly evolving industry, and we are focused on developing AI that is safe and beneficial for everyone\u201d.In a LinkedIn post, Bamford acknowledged the \u201cexceptionally extended\u201d length of time between the start of the CMA\u2019s review and Wednesday\u2019s decision, at a time when the agency was under pressure from ministers and industry executives to move more quickly and predictably in its merger reviews. He blamed the complexity and changing nature of partnerships between big tech groups and AI start-ups for the delay. \u201cWe are not blind to the length of time that this investigation has taken \u2014 particularly given the reforms we have launched recently which will considerably speed up and streamline the UK mergers process,\u201d he said. \u201cWe know pace matters to business confidence and investment.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Summarize this content to 2000 words in 6 paragraphs in Arabic Unlock the Editor\u2019s Digest for freeRoula Khalaf, Editor of the FT, selects her favourite stories in this weekly newsletter.Microsoft\u2019s $13bn investment in OpenAI has been cleared by the UK\u2019s competition regulator, weeks after the artificial intelligence start-up struck a new partnership with SoftBank that<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[63],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-230273","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-tech"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/globetimeline.com\/ar\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/230273","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/globetimeline.com\/ar\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/globetimeline.com\/ar\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/globetimeline.com\/ar\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/globetimeline.com\/ar\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=230273"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/globetimeline.com\/ar\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/230273\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/globetimeline.com\/ar\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=230273"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/globetimeline.com\/ar\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=230273"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/globetimeline.com\/ar\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=230273"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}