The Competition and Markets Authority, the U.K.’s antitrust watchdog, has opened an investigation into whether IBM’s planned acquisition of cloud software vendor HashiCorp would affect competition.
The CMA said Monday it was inviting comment on the merger from interested parties by January 16. The regulator set a provisional February 25 deadline to decide whether to clear the deal or refer it for further review.
As The Wall Street Journal reports, IBM announced it agreed to buy HashiCorp in April for around $6.4 billion. The takeover, should it proceed, would extend IBM’s push into cloud and AI, and give the company access to HashiCorp’s roster of about 4,400 customers.
San Francisco-based HashiCorp, founded in 2012 by Mitchell Hashimoto and Armon Dadgar, provides tools to help manage cloud infrastructure and security.
The CMA notified Hashicorp in August it would begin would be reviewing the merger. The U.S. Federal Trade Commission is also investigating the deal.
