The United Kingdom's Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) announced on Thursday that it is launching an official inquiry into the partnership between Google's owner Aphabet Inc. and artificial intelligence company Anthropic. The CMA started an initial review of the deal in July.
The regulator said it has until December 19 to decide whether it wants to move forward to a phase 2 investigation. Google invested some $2 billion in Anthropic last year. The CMA's probe was launched due to concerns the deal could result in a "substantial lessening of competition."