At first, Meta wanted to buy the GIF sharing service called Giphy. But there were several twists. Last I heard, the decision of the Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) was to order Meta to sell Giphy. And now the judges have asked the CMA to reconsider this decision.
In a statement to Bloomberg, the CMA admitted that it had agreed to reconsider its decision once again because there was an important discovery. This process should take them three months at most. Faced with this latest development, the representative of Meta requested by The Verge refused to issue any comment.
The previous ruling ordered Meta to sell Giphy
For starters, the UK competition regulator intervened in the deal between Meta and Giphy over concerns it would harm other platforms that use the popular gif-sharing service. In other words, the reason was that, in their opinion, it could harm competition.
Therefore, the CMA ordered the tech giant to untie the established deal and sell Giphy. At the time, the CMA said that by doing so it was protecting millions of social media users and positively driving competition and innovation in digital advertising.
Why did the court change its mind?
Meta had communicated its ambition to acquire Giphy in May 2020. The competition appeal tribunal was all the time for the UK competition regulator. Indeed, on five of the six complaints, he was always in favor of the CMA. Only, on the latest claim, it turned out that the CMA did not properly inform Meta about Snapchat’s acquisition of Gfycat. So, to fix this mistake, she will reconsider her decision and so Meta will have the opportunity to comment on the final report.
It was said that Meta did not want to comment on the subject. However, last month, Christopher Sgro, spokesperson for Meta, once again reiterated the company’s contribution to Giphy. He said they believe their investment will significantly improve Giphy’s product for its users.
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