EU To Look Into Apple’s Acquisition Of Shazam

Late last year following the rumors, Apple announced that they would be acquiring song recognition service Shazam. Apple and Shazam have worked together in the past, where way back in 2014, Apple integrated Shazam into iOS where users could use Siri to ask for song identification (which admittedly wasn’t necessarily faster).

This is why Apple acquiring the company kind of makes sense and doesn’t really come as a surprise. However it seems that not everyone might be on board with the acquisition, such as the European Commission who announced that they will be taking a closer look at the deal to see if it meets “competition standards”.

The request for the investigation was made by Austria, but they were later joined by other EU countries such as France, Iceland, Italy, Norway, Spain and Sweden. According to the Commission, “On the basis of the elements submitted by Austria and the countries joining the referral request, and without prejudice to the outcome of its full investigation, the Commission considers that the transaction may have a significant adverse effect on competition in the European Economic Area.”

They also add, “The Commission has also concluded that it is the best placed authority to deal with the potential cross-border effects of the transaction.” Whether or not this will affect the deal remains to be seen, but then again regulators investigating acquisitions that could result in a monopoly or anti-competitive behavior isn’t new and is sometimes to be expected.

Tyler Lee
Categories: Apple, General
Tags: Apps, iOS, Legal, shazam