UK regulators scrutinize Google parent’s partnership with AI startup Anthropic

Britain’s antitrust watchdog is investigating Google parent Alphabet’s cooperation with artificial intelligence firm Anthropic and its potential impact on competition, the commission said on Tuesday.

More than 18 months after Microsoft-backed OpenAI launched ChatGPT, which sparked an AI boom, antitrust regulators around the world have grown increasingly alarmed by a slew of partnerships done between smaller sector startups and large internet companies.

Microsoft’s connections with startups such as OpenAI, Inflection AI, and Mistral AI are under review, as are Alphabet’s ties to smaller companies like as Anthropic and Cohere.

Anthropic’s Claude AI models have competed for attention alongside OpenAI’s GPT series.

Last week, Britain’s Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) released a joint statement with its colleagues in the United States and the European Union, committing to work together to ensure fair competition in the artificial intelligence business.

Anthropic, co-founded by former OpenAI executives and siblings Dario and Daniela Amodei, said last year that it had acquired a $500 million investment from Alphabet, with an additional $1.5 billion promised over time.

On Tuesday, the CMA announced that it was now collecting comments on whether the Alphabet-Anthropic agreement could reduce competition in the UK, with a deadline of August 13 for responses.

At the conclusion of this procedure, the body will decide whether to conduct an official investigation.

Alphabet did not immediately respond to a request for comment. A spokeswoman for Anthropic declined to comment.