The world's largest search engine, Google Inc, announced that there would be no challenge forwarded by antitrust regulatory authorities as to its purchase of Israeli mapping applications Waze. This was confirmed by anonymous sources familiar with the transaction.
The Federal Trade Commission had not raised any concerns on the possibility that the transaction would be anticompetitive. Google said it was contacted by the commission last June 21 about the transaction.
Google announced last June 11 it was acquiring Waze through a deal that would help the company and its users in navigating traffic through the use of their smartphones. The Waze deal was valued then at USD1.1 billion. Google offered under a standstill agreement to maintain the Waze business, branding and sales different from the search engine's interest. This was due to the deal facing scrutiny from UK antitrust authorities, according to a statement last September 17. This was published on the website of the Office of Fair Trading based out of London, England.
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