CMA gives approval to £54billion tech tie-up

Watchdogs have cleared the £54billion takeover of cloud storing business VMware by chipmaker Broadcom.

The Competition and Markets Authority said the merger of the two American companies would not damage the computer market in the UK. It is the biggest deal ever approved by the regulator.

The CMA said Broadcom would not be able to use the deal to harm rivals in the industry or use the merger to spy on competitors who use VMware software.

Broadcom’s £54billion takeover is the biggest deal ever approved by the CMA

Approval for the deal comes as the CMA continues to examine whether it should backtrack on its decision in April to block Microsoft’s £54bn acquisition of Call Of Duty maker Activision Blizzard.

The CMA had warned a merger would encourage Microsoft to raise the cost of gaming subscriptions and could mean ‘reduced innovation and less choice for UK gamers’.

Microsoft’s boss Brad Smith claimed at the time that regulators were making the UK a bad place to do business.

But the watchdog is now weighing up whether to clear the deal after a US judge gave the merger a thumbs-up last month.