The U.K. has submitted Microsoft’s employment of several former workers from artificial intelligence firm Inflection for a first merger probe.
Inflection’s co-founder Mustafa Suleyman and the majority of the startup’s employees were hired.
The hiring should be evaluated to determine whether it qualifies as a merger under U.K. regulations and, as such, could lead to less competition in the AI industry.
The CMA may refer a matter for a comprehensive inquiry, referred to as a “Phase 2” probe, if it determines that additional investigation is warranted.
The CMA stated that by September 11th, it would make an announcement regarding whether or not to send the case for a Phase 2 inquiry.
Along with several other important personnel, Microsoft announced in March that it had hired Suleyman from Inflection.
Suleyman was named executive vice president and chief executive officer of Microsoft AI, a recently established division of the corporation devoted to artificial intelligence technologies, such as Copilot, the AI assistant that Microsoft has included into its Windows and Microsoft 365 operating systems.
The Washington-based software behemoth has appointed Karen Simonyan as a senior executive and appointed Suleyman as its principal scientific officer, answering to Suleyman.
Source (CNBC)
