(Bloomberg) — The US Federal Trade Commission is moving ahead with a sprawling antitrust probe of Microsoft Corp. that was opened in the waning days of the Biden Administration, signaling that Donald Trump’s new FTC Chair Andrew Ferguson is going to prioritize scrutiny of tech giants.
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FTC staff in recent weeks have continued to work on the investigation, meeting with companies and other groups to gather information, according to people familiar with the matter, who asked not to be named discussing a confidential investigation.
The FTC sent Microsoft a so-called civil investigative demand, which is similar to a subpoena, late last year. The document, a copy of which was viewed by Bloomberg, compels the company to turn over reams of data about its AI operations, including the cost to train models and obtain data, going as far back as 2016. The agency sought details about Microsoft’s data centers, its struggles to find enough computing power to meet customer demand and the company’s software licensing practices.
The FTC is also scrutinizing Microsoft’s decision to slash funding on its own artificial intelligence projects after striking a deal with OpenAI, which could be perceived as hurting competition in the burgeoning AI market.
One company has heard regularly from the FTC on the issue of Microsoft’s licensing practices since the investigative demand was sent, said one of the people. The FTC and lawyers for that company have discussed what information the agency could ask for in a more comprehensive, formal request. The company also received a shorter list of questions several weeks ago asking for documents the company provided to other regulators. The FTC is further seeking information about licensing rule changes Microsoft said will go into effect later this year, the person said.
Seeking Details
The agency said in the information demand that it wants to determine whether Microsoft’s profits from other parts of the business give it an edge over other AI companies. The agency also said it wants details about Microsoft’s data center capacity constraints to better understand the costs behind cloud-computing services. Those details will help the agency determine whether to bring a case.
Since receiving the FTC demand, Microsoft may have sought to narrow the scope of the information it’s being asked to turn over — a typical move by companies being probed by the agency. Such wide-ranging antitrust investigations can take years and don’t always result in the agency bringing a case.
“We are working cooperatively with the agency,” said Alex Haurek, a Microsoft spokesman. The FTC didn’t respond to a request for comment.
The evolution of the probe now rests in the hands of Ferguson and his new head of competition, Daniel Guarnera, who joined the agency from the Justice Department, where he worked on antitrust cases targeting Alphabet Inc.’s Google and Apple Inc.
In his first public remarks since taking the chair position in late February, Ferguson said investigating the tech sector is his highest priority. Early moves include seeking information on censorship by tech companies.
Ferguson also backed a filing in January in support of billionaire Elon Musk, who sued to derail OpenAI’s plans to restructure as a more conventional for-profit business.
The civil investigative demand was crafted by FTC staff and personally signed off on by former Chair Lina Khan after the agency spent more than a year conducting informal interviews with Microsoft competitors and business partners, Bloomberg previously reported.
Ferguson’s FTC has inherited several other cases against big tech companies from Khan, including lawsuits against Meta Platforms Inc. and Amazon.com Inc. On Wednesday, the agency asked a judge to delay a trial challenging Amazon’s Prime subscription practices, citing resource constraints at the agency. The FTC quickly walked back comments that resource constraints at the agency will hamper its ability to start a trial in September.
A separate antitrust case against Amazon’s retail business is set to go to trial in October 2026.
Earlier: FTC Flip-Flops on Scant Resource Claim in Amazon Prime Case (2)
Most of the questions in the information demand relate to how Microsoft licenses its software products, particularly as it relates to the company’s cloud-computing business. Competitors have complained that Microsoft’s licensing terms and bundling of both its popular office productivity and security software with its cloud offerings makes it harder for them to compete.
About a third of the questions focus on Microsoft’s AI business, highlighting the importance of the burgeoning technology to the company’s future. Underlying the FTC’s requests are concerns that Microsoft canceled some of its own work after deciding to invest in deciding to invest in OpenAI and learning heavily on its GPT software, eliminating potential competition.
OpenAI Investment
Despite the hefty sum, Microsoft didn’t disclose its investment to competition regulators ahead of time, and the FTC also has been investigating whether the deal was structured as a partnership to avoid a merger investigation, Bloomberg has reported.
When Microsoft first invested in OpenAI in 2019, the startup was a promising research lab looking for a way to fund the cloud-computing power required to create AI models. Microsoft started with a $1 billion infusion after co-founder Musk withdrew his backing. Microsoft had been working on various AI projects of its own for more than two decades and feared it was falling behind rival Google.
The company’s efforts were scattered across several divisions and not producing the results Chief Executive Officer Satya Nadella had hoped for. In 2023, one month after pumping an additional $10 billion into OpenAI, Microsoft began unveiling a series of products infused with OpenAI technology. Microsoft pulled back on its internal effort to develop the technology, which raised a red flag for the FTC.
(Updates with FTC reversal on resources in 13th paragraph.)
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