[Ren Chong, Special correspondent of the Global Times, Yang Shuyu, reporter of the Global Times] Recently, foreign media continue to argue that the EU and other regulatory agencies are fighting a new antitrust campaign. Different from the previous campaign against Internet giants, the business activities involved in this campaign will shape new markets, including artificial intelligence. The Associated Press reported on June 29 that a senior EU official said on the 28th that the EU was strengthening its review of the AI industry, including reviewing the partnership between Microsoft and OpenAI, the leading AI enterprise, worth tens of billions of dollars.
"The pretence of exerting control influence"
Margaret Vestager, Executive Vice President of the European Commission and Competition Commissioner, said in a speech, "Over the years, Microsoft has invested 13 billion dollars in OpenAI. We must ensure that such a partnership will not become a cover for one partner to exert control over another."
Reuters reported that the cooperation between Microsoft and OpenAI is facing the anti-monopoly investigation of the European Union. Wistag mentioned in particular that the European Commission "is currently sending a request for follow-up information on the agreement between Microsoft and OpenAI" to understand whether some exclusivity clauses will have a negative impact on competitors. The EU will use its anti-monopoly rules to investigate abuses by companies that dominate the market.
Weistager also mentioned the concern that large technology companies hinder small AI developers from reaching users and enterprises. She said: "We also sent a request for information to better understand the impact of the agreement between Google and Samsung - to pre install its small Gemini Nano (the smallest version of Google's Gemini AI basic model) on some Samsung devices." In January this year, Google reached a multi-year agreement with the Korean company, Embed its generative AI technology into Samsung's Galaxy S24 series smart phones.
In March, the Committee also sent information requests to large AI companies such as Microsoft, Google, Facebook and TikTok, and reviewed these responses.
Pull and fight against start-ups
"Technology giants are shaping the market in an anti competitive way." A recent research report on the big language model published by the British Competition and Market Administration said that since 2019, Alphabet, Amazon, Apple, Meta, Microsoft and Nvidia have established more than 90 partnerships with big language model manufacturers. According to the report, technology giants may exert influence on partners by providing key inputs such as computing power and data, and controlling access to consumers through their platforms.
"Their control over the network covering billions of people, as well as the large amount of personal data they have, is a formidable obstacle for start-ups," commented the Financial Times.
Pan Helin, a well-known economist and member of the Committee of Experts on Information and Communication Economy of the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology, said in an interview with the Global Times on June 30 that the "bundling" of the cooperation between technology giants and AI companies would take advantage of the user ecology of technology giants to occupy a large share in the market, and the technology giants would have a great influence on data, computing power Algorithms and other AI basics have more resources than start-ups. AI companies bundled with giants will therefore stand out and suppress the start-ups in the AI industry.
In addition, a recent report on the US quartz finance website pointed out that technology giants are investing heavily in AI, investing billions of dollars, poaching talents, and annexing small companies that develop global AI technology. Amazon has invested $4 billion in artificial intelligence startup Anthropic to use its technology. Apple earlier this year acquired Canadian startup Darwin AI, which is one of the many AI companies that the company has low-key acquisitions. In March this year, Microsoft also paid a "license fee" of $650 million to use the company's model and hire most of its employees by "acquiring and hiring" the startup Inflection.
Pan Helin said through analysis, "In fact, the real monopoly technique of technology giants is not bundling sales, but to monopolize the essential resources of AI technology development".
"This exclusive party may not last long"
According to Bloomberg, Andreas, director of the German Federal Cartel Bureau, said at the agency's annual press conference, "The concentration of the digital market will be further deepened, and the strength at all levels, from the chip to the front end, will be enhanced, which is a great danger." Shiying Financial website also said, Nvidia is leading the data center chip market that provides power for AI software, while OpenAI is leading the field of AI chat robots. These companies, together with several other companies, are leading the field of AI. "But this exclusive party may not last long," the report commented. In addition to the European Union, regulators in the United States and the United Kingdom are also closely watching the Union. Relevant institutions in the United States are investigating the possible anti competitive behaviors of technology giants such as Microsoft, Nvidia and OpenAI in the field of artificial intelligence.
According to the Financial Times, the antitrust investigation usually lasts for several years, while the M&A review cycle is much shorter. The focus of the investigation is the behavior that may damage competitors. Companies that are finally found to be in violation of the law (such as bundling products or preventing competitors from acquiring key technologies) will face huge fines and legal liabilities, requiring them to change their behavior.
As for the impact of antitrust investigation on consumers and the market, Aoer, director of competition policy of the International Center for Law and Economics, believes that Microsoft and OpenAI will have to invest a lot of resources to meet compliance requirements, rather than developing the latest and best AI products. This may allow competitors to catch up with their market dominance, thus benefiting the AI market. However, considering that the government's review of science and technology and artificial intelligence is becoming more and more strict, this will also hinder innovation to some extent.
Barnett, the antitrust lawyer of American law firm Susman Godfrey, told the website of Quartz Finance and Economics that consumers should know that this survey is "a good thing" for them, which can help AI companies with less resources to participate in competition and innovation, and provide consumers with choices of different AI tools to reduce their overall costs.
Editor in charge: Zhu Gabe
