A judge on Friday ruled against the Federal Trade Commission’s request to block Meta Platforms from buying virtual reality content maker Inside Unlimited, dismissing the regulator’s concerns. that the deal would reduce competition in a new market.
A December test to decide if meta can continue with relatively small agreement considered a test of FTCtheir efforts to counter what they see as a repeat of the company’s upcoming acquisition of small rivals to dominate the market, this time in the nascent virtual and augmented reality markets.
The ruling was issued in sealed form earlier this week. The version released on Friday night has been redacted.
A spokesperson for Meta said Facebook And Instagram owners are “satisfied that the Court has rejected the FTC’s offer to block our acquisition of Inside.”
“We look forward to completing the transaction soon,” the spokesperson said in a statement.
The FTC did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
U.S. District Court Judge Edward Davila for the Northern District of California said the FTC had failed to demonstrate that Meta would enter the market to create specialized fitness content if it could not purchase Inside.
“While Meta boasts substantial VR technical and financial resources, it does not possess capabilities unique to virtual reality dedicated exercise applicationspecifically fitness content production facilities and studios,” the judge wrote.
The decision is good news for Meta boss and founder Mark Zuckerberg, who defended the acquisition in testimony in December, arguing that his company is helping to build but not dominate the industry. virtual reality industry.
Zuckerberg testified in federal court in San Jose, California, that owning Inside was “not so important” to Meta’s ambitions and that “it’s not as important that we own experiences as they exist.” in.”
The FTC sued Meta in July to block the Inside deal, asking the judge to issue a preliminary injunction, saying that Meta’s “conquest of VR” began in 2014 when it acquired Oculus, an earphone maker. listen to VR.
© Thomson Reuters 2023
