"US Investigates Overlapping Directors and Executives Among AI Competitors"

U.S. authorities are reportedly examining whether there is overlap among board members and executives between competing artificial intelligence (AI) companies, citing potential violations of antitrust laws.

According to Bloomberg on the 10th (local time), Andrew Forman, Deputy Assistant Attorney General of the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) Antitrust Division, stated at a conference held in Washington that day, "The DOJ is monitoring AI competitors that share board members," adding, "This is an area we are particularly focused on."

Currently, U.S. antitrust laws prohibit individuals or entities from serving concurrently on the boards of two companies that directly compete with each other. This is based on the judgment that overlapping directors or executives could interfere with the management of rival companies and hinder competition. Previously, the Joe Biden administration urged companies such as Warner Bros. Discovery and Nextdoor Holdings to have certain board members resign in relation to this issue.

The report stated, "Many promising AI startups heavily rely on the funding and infrastructure of tech companies, raising concerns among antitrust authorities," and mentioned recent AI startup investments by Microsoft (MS), Amazon, and Google. In particular, MS, which invested $13 billion in OpenAI, revealed how closely the two companies are connected during the process in which CEO Sam Altman was ousted and then reinstated. The subsequent antitrust reviews initiated by the European Union (EU) and the United Kingdom are also interpreted against this backdrop.

MS recently also invested in Mistral, known as the French version of OpenAI. Amazon and Google have each committed to investing $4 billion and $2 billion, respectively, in Anthropic, a rival startup to OpenAI.

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.