Microsoft’s multibillion-dollar investment in artificial intelligence firm OpenAI could face a full-blown merger investigation in the European Union, EU officials signaled Tuesday. The European Commission, which is the executive arm of the EU, said that it was embarking on a competition investigation looking at the markets for virtual worlds and generative artificial intelligence. As part of its assessment, the Commission said that it wants to understand how competitive these markets are currently and gain insight on how competition law can help these fields. The EU Commission also said it is “looking into some of the agreements that have been concluded between large digital market players and generative AI developers and providers” and singled out the Microsoft-OpenAI tie-up as a particular deal it will be studying. “The European Commission is checking whether Microsoft’s investment in OpenAI might be reviewable under the EU Merger Regulation,” the Commission said in a statement on Tuesday. Microsoft did not immediately respond to a CNBC request for comment. The Commission said it has sent requests for information to “several large digital players” and is also seeking views from interested parties, which have until March 11 to submit responses. “Virtual worlds and generative AI are rapidly developing,” Vestager said in a statement Tuesday. “It is fundamental that these new markets stay competitive, and that nothing stands in the way of businesses growing and providing the best and most innovative products to consumers.” Microsoft has put billions of dollars into OpenAI, the firm behind the popular AI chatbot ChatGPT. The company has integrated some OpenAI technology into its Office, Bing, and Windows products and provides OpenAI with its own Azure cloud computing tools.
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