Matt Gaetz has railed against Big Tech companies. If he becomes Trump's attorney general, he'd have legal power to act on his complaints.

A federal judge ruled on Wednesday that an FTC complaint alleging that Facebook's acquisitions of Instagram and WhatsApp were anticompetitive should proceed to a jury trial.

The Federal Trade Commission will get a chance to argue its case for Meta’s breakup in court. On Wednesday, US District Judge James Boasberg allowed the FTC’s lawsuit against the social media giant to move forward (PDF link). The FTC first sued Meta in 2020 in an attempt to force the company, then known as Facebook, to divest itself of Instagram and WhatsApp. Alongside dozens of attorneys general, the agency alleged Meta acquired the platforms in 2012 and 2014 to stifle growing competition in the social media market.

This past April, Meta asked Judge Boasberg to dismiss the case. In addition to noting that the FTC had previously approved both acquisitions, Meta argued that the agency had failed to show that the company held monopoly power in the social networking services market, and that, in buying Instagram and WhatsApp, it had harmed consumers. Additionally, the company claimed that it had invested billions of dollars in both platforms and made them better as a result, to the benefit of social media users everywhere.

While he did not entirely dismiss the lawsuit, Boasberg did force the FTC to narrow its case, dismissing an allegation that Facebook had provided preferential access to developers who agreed not to compete with it.

“We are confident that the evidence at trial will show that the acquisitions of Instagram and WhatsApp have been good for competition and consumers. More than 10 years after the FTC reviewed and cleared these deals, and despite the overwhelming evidence that our services compete with YouTube, TikTok, X, Apple’s iMessage, and many others, the Commission is wrongly continuing to assert that no deal is ever truly final, and businesses can be punished for innovating,” a Meta spokesperson told Engadget. “We will review the opinion when it’s filed.”

Judge Boasberg will meet with the two sides on November 25 to schedule the trial. The FTC lawsuit, it should be noted, was filed under the previous Trump administration, though whether it moves forward and in what form will depend on who President-elect Trump appoints to lead the agency.

Zymo Research Corporation (Zymo Research), a leader in innovative life science solutions, announced today that it has filed claims in the United District Court for the Central District of California against Qiagen GmbH (Qiagen) alleging that Qiagen has engaged in antitrust violations and improperly interfered with Zymo Research's contractual relations.

Intel fired back at AMD in rebutting its antitrust lawsuit, saying the company has only itself to blame for not being competitive as a microprocessor supplier, with an inability to ship products on time, which helped to earn the...

Last month, Meta, which owns Facebook, Whatsapp and Instagram, failed to reach a deal with the Italian society of authors and publishers SIAE, to renew copyright licenses.

If Mehta rules that Google has been running an illegal monopoly in search, the punishment could open up new online avenues for consumers and businesses to explore in pursuit of information, entertainment and commerce.

Earlier this fall, the Federal Trade Commission filed a high-stakes lawsuit against Amazon.

In that suit, the FTC claims Amazon is a monopoly, and it accuses the company of using anti-competitive tactics to hold onto its market power. It's a big case, with implications for consumers and businesses and digital marketplaces, and for antitrust law itself. That is the highly important but somewhat obscure body of law that deals with competition and big business.

And so, this week on Planet Money, we are doing a deep dive on the history of antitrust. It begins with today's episode, a Planet Money double feature. Two classic episodes that tell the story of how the U.S. government's approach to big business and competition has changed over time.

First, the story of a moment more than 100 years ago, when the government stepped into the free market in a big way to make competition work. It's the story of John D. Rockefeller and Standard Oil, and a muckraking journalist named Ida Tarbell.

Then, we fast forward to a turning point that took antitrust in the other direction. This is the story of a lawyer named Robert Bork, who transformed the way courts would interpret antitrust law.

These episodes were produced by Sally Helm with help from Alexi Horowitz Ghazi. They were edited by Bryant Urdstadt. Alex Goldmark is Planet Money's executive producer.

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When Lina Khan was in law school back in 2017, she wrote a law review article called 'Amazon's Antitrust Paradox,' that went kinda viral in policy circles. In it, she argued that antitrust enforcement in the U.S. was behind the times. For decades, regulators had focused narrowly on consumer welfare, and they'd bring companies to court only when they thought consumers were being harmed by things like rising prices. But in the age of digital platforms like Amazon and Facebook, Khan argued in the article, the time had come for a more proactive approach to antitrust.

Just four years later, President Biden appointed Lina Khan to be the Chair of the Federal Trade Commission, one of the main government agencies responsible for enforcing antitrust in America, putting her in the rare position of putting some of her ideas into practice.

Now, two years into the job, Khan has taken some big swings at big tech companies like Meta and Microsoft. But the FTC has also faced a couple of big losses in the courts. On today's show, a conversation with FTC Chair Lina Khan on what it's like to try to turn audacious theory into bureaucratic practice, the FTC's new lawsuit against Amazon, and what it all means for business as usual.

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Brussels launches antitrust probe into Google's digital ad tech practices

Cloud provider allegedly approached by Google ratted out shady group to Microsoft.

In a major blow to Google, a federal judge on Monday ruled that the tech giant maintained and abused a monopoly on web searches.

After years of complaining about Google's dominance in search, Yelp sued after a federal judge recently ruled that Google has an illegal monopoly in search.

Zymo Research believes that Qiagen’s lawsuit is part of a larger strategy to misuse litigation as a tool to stifle innovation and delay the adoption of groundbreaking technologies that benefit the scientific and medical communities.  

China's Xiaomi had complained to the Competition Commission of India (CCI) that the report - which found Flipkart, some of its sellers, and smartphone players in violation of competition laws - contained commercial secrets that should have been redacted, Reuters reported in September.

The developer of an app dropped from the App Store in China has filed a lawsuit that challenges Apple's overall practices, as well as damages of $420,000.

Citing a pattern of predatory acquisitions, a “buy or bury” strategy deployed against third-party developers, and the erosion of users’ privacy protections, Attorney General Kathy Jennings announced Wednesday that Delaware and other states are suing Facebook. The suit charges Facebook Inc. with violating the Sherman Antitrust Act and the Clayton Antitrust Act and seeks to end […]

Complaint alleges Google illegally maintains App Store monopoly Attorney General Kathy Jennings announced Thursday that Delaware and other state have filed suit against Google, alleging exclusionary conduct relating to the Google Play Store for Android mobile devices and Google Billing.  This antitrust lawsuit is the newest legal action against the tech giant, claiming illegal, anti-competitive, […]

European Commission looks into alleged exclusivity, pricing, and patent demands.

A €1.06 billion EU antitrust penalty on chipmaker Intel for abuse of dominance dating back to 2009 (when it was equivalent to $1.45 billion) has been consigned to the history books after the bloc’s top court rejected the Commission’s appeal against a 2022 lower court ruling that annulled the sanction. “The Court of Justice dismisses […]

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On Wednesday, the European Union opened an investigation of U.S. manufacturer Corning over possible anti-competitive practices. Corning may not be a name that’s super familiar to the average tech consumer, but you are almost certainly within touching distance of its products, as it’s a leading supplier of speciality toughened glass for mobile devices, including Apple’s […]

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The Competition Commission of India (CCI) investigation finds Zomato and Swiggy breached competition laws with exclusive deals favoring restaurant chains

India's antitrust body has recalled its investigation report into competition law breaches by e-commerce giant Walmart's Flipkart

Mr. Trump is also likely to pull back on some policies that have irritated dealmakers under the Biden administration, attorneys said

Following scrutiny, companies are proposing remedies for mergers that will consolidate the titanium dioxide and industrial gas industries

The Office of Trade Competition Commission is awaiting CP Group's request for merger approval to study the impact on the economy, market competition and consumers.

The post CP Group’s $10b Tesco deal to test mettle of Thai antitrust watchdog appeared first on DealStreetAsia.

On 21 December 2017, the French Competition Authority (the “FCA”) published a decision imposing a fine of 30 million euros on Brenntag SA and Brenntag AG (together “Brenntag”) for obstructing longstanding investigations (the ...

You may have a credit in your Kindle account from a legal settlement that you probably didn't realize you were a part of. Time for a book shopping spree.

The Department of Justice has released the agenda and list of participants for its March 11, 2020, public workshop to solicit public dialogue on the proposed vertical merger guidelines. The workshop will be the first in a two-part series hosted together with the Federal Trade Commission. The two half-day workshops will allow for a dynamic discussion about the proposed guidelines to complement the written public comments about the proposed guidelines that were submitted to the agencies.

Two commercial flooring executives, Robert A. Patrey Jr. and Kenneth R. Smith, pleaded guilty for their role in an antitrust conspiracy to rig bids and fix prices for commercial flooring services and products sold in the United States, the Department of Justice announced. The defendants are cooperating with the Justice Department’s ongoing investigation.

The Department of Justice Antitrust Division announced today that it has adopted a series of temporary changes to its civil merger investigation processes, which will remain in place during the pendency of the coronavirus (COVID-19) event. These changes will ensure that the Antitrust Division will be able to continue operations as its employees carry out their duties to protect American consumers under a mass telework directive, in accordance with health guidance from the CDC, WHO, and other health authorities.

The U.S. Department of Justice Antitrust Division and The Federal Trade Commission today issued a joint statement detailing an expedited antitrust procedure and providing guidance for collaborations of businesses working to protect the health and safety of Americans during the COVID-19 pandemic.

The Department of Justice announced today that it is requiring United Technologies Corporation (UTC) and Raytheon Company (Raytheon) to divest Raytheon’s military airborne radios business and UTC’s military global positioning systems (“GPS”) and large space-based optical systems businesses in order to proceed with their proposed merger.  Without these divestitures, the merger would eliminate competition between two of the primary suppliers of military airborne radios and military GPS systems to the Department of Defense (DoD), and enable the merged firm to lessen competition for multiple components used in reconnaissance satellites sold to DoD and the wider U.S. intelligence community.  

Florida Cancer Specialists & Research Institute LLC (FCS), an oncology group headquartered in Fort Myers, Florida, was charged with conspiring to allocate medical and radiation oncology treatments for cancer patients in Southwest Florida, the Department of Justice announced.  This charge is the first in the department’s ongoing investigation into market allocation in the oncology industry.

Cengage Learning Holdings II Inc. and McGraw-Hill Education Inc. mutually agreed to abandon their plans to merge after the Department of Justice informed the companies it had serious concerns that the proposed transaction, as structured, would harm competition.

WASHINGTON (AP) — House lawmakers investigating the market dominance of Big Tech are asking Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos to testify to address possible misleading statements by the company on its competition practices. In a letter to Bezos on Friday, leaders of the House Judiciary Committee from both parties are holding out the threat of a […]

(United States Second Circuit) - In an antitrust action, alleging that Time Warner's requiring consumers to lease cable boxes in order to receive a package of television channels violates the Sherman Act, 15 U.S.C., section 1, the district court's dismissal is affirmed where plaintiff's third amended complaint fails to: 1) plausibly allege that the cable boxes are a separate product from the premium cable channels; and 2) plausibly allege defendant's market power in the particular product and geographic markets defined in the complaint.

(United States DC Circuit) - Affirmed. The denial of class certification in the case of thousands of shippers allegedly harmed by a price fixing conspiracy among freight railroads was affirmed because their evidence for proving causation, injury, and damages on a class wide basis measured negative damages for over 2,000 members.

(United States Third Circuit) - Reversing the District Court dismissal of complaints in litigation that alleged Lipitor's fraudulent patent procurement and other misconduct because the allegations were plausible, and reversing the dismissal of allegations in Effexor litigation because it was plausible that the companies holding the pharmaceutical patents and generic manufacturers entered into reverse payment settlement agreements that subjected them to antitrust scrutiny.

This week host Matt Egan is rejoined by Macworld.co.uk acting editor David Price to chat about Apple's latest Macbook announcements. Then online editor at ComputerworldUK Christina Mercer jumps in to give a break down of Google's fight with the EU over antitrust infringements (13:00). Finally, ex-dating app user Scott Carey, online editor at Techworld.com gives a state of the union on dating apps, from Tinder to Bumble to Happn, if they are good for society and which one is set to corner the market (27:00).  

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The Italian legislation on private antitrust enforcement (Legislative Decree no. 3 of 19 January 2017 - Decree) has implemented the EU Directive no. 2014/104. The Decree sets out the rules according to which any natural or legal person who has suffe...

A former high-level shipping executive was sentenced today to serve 48 months in jail and to pay a $20,000 criminal fine for his role in an antitrust conspiracy involving the transportation of goods to and from the continental United States and Puerto Rico by ocean vessel. This is the longest jail sentence ever imposed for a single antitrust charge.

The Department’s Antitrust Division today announced the appointment of its new leadership team including the Chief of Staff, four Deputy Assistant Attorneys General, and a Special Counsel for Competition Policy. Two Deputies will oversee civil matters, one Deputy will oversee economic analysis and one Deputy will oversee international, policy and appellate issues.

Christine A. Varney, Assistant Attorney General in charge of the Department’s Antitrust Division, today announced that the Department is withdrawing, effective immediately, a report relating to monopolization offenses under the antitrust laws that was issued in September 2008. As of today, the Section 2 report will no longer be Department of Justice policy. Consumers, businesses, courts and antitrust practitioners should not rely on it as Department of Justice antitrust enforcement policy.

The Department's Antitrust Division announced the details of its newly formed initiative aimed at preparing government officials and contractors to recognize and report efforts by parties to unlawfully profit from the stimulus projects that are being awarded as part of The American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009.