Microsoft’s bid to acquire social network LinkedIn has met the approval of the European Union. The tech giant now has all the required regulatory approvals to go ahead with the acquisition that was announced earlier this year.
A blog post on Microsoft said that the European Commission had passed approval of the $26 billion deal on the basis of certain conditions. These conditions include the continuation of the availability of the Office Ad-in program for third party social networking sites.
Microsoft also assured that it would not necessitate computer manufacturers in EEA (European Economic Area) to install the LinkedIn app and the Windows 10 tile. Users would not be pressured into installing the LinkedIn app, and would be given the option of removing it, if already present.
It also said that information on Microsoft Graph would be available to other social networks, besides LinkedIn.
These concessions will remain in place, and be honoured for the next five years.
The main worry of antitrust regulators at the EU was an amalgamation of the user databases of Microsoft and LinkedIn. “This could have been reinforced by shutting out LinkedIn’s competitors from access to Microsoft’s application programming interfaces, which they need to interoperate with Microsoft’s products and to access user data stored in the Microsoft cloud,” the EU Commission said in a statement on Wednesday.
Another issue was the fact that the merger would deal a blow to competitors. The acquisition could also possibly deter the entry of new participants into the field of professional networking services in the EEA, which includes all the member states of the EU with Iceland, Norway and Lichtenstein.
However, Salesforce.com Inc, a main competitor in the acquisition of LinkedIn, claimed that the deal would give Microsoft an unfair advantage over its rivals, as it would open up LinkedIn’s extensive data on users to Microsoft.
