Google & Apple Boards Investigated
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The regulators at the FTC [Federal Trade Commission] are looking at the Board of Directors for both Apple and Google. It appears there could be a violation of the Clayton Antitrust Act of 1914 which prohibits a member of a competing company being on the board of a rival. The boards of both companies appear to have a member of their rivals in place as board members. Both companies have been notified by the FTC of the investigation.
According to the N.Y. Times article it states that:
Antitrust experts say the provision against “interlocking directorates,” known as Section 8 of the act, is rarely enforced. Nevertheless, the agency has already notified Google and Apple of its interest in the matter, according to the people briefed on the inquiry, who agreed to speak on condition of anonymity because the inquiry was confidential.
F.T.C. officials declined to comment. Spokespeople for Apple and Google also declined to comment. A spokesman for Genentech declined to make Mr. Levinson available for comment.
The inquiry, which appears to be in its early stages, is the second antitrust examination involving Google to have surfaced in recent days. It suggests that despite the company’s closeness to the Obama administration, Google will not escape scrutiny from regulators.
If this in fact true, both companies need to correct the situation. Also it is good to see that the Obama administration is letting the investigation proceed.
2 Comments
Ryan Farmer
May 5th, 2009
at 1:44pm
They need to scrutinize Obama for packing former Microsoft and RIAA executives into high level cabinet positions, including the procurement of software contracts.
I’m not singling Obama out either, Bush II and Clinton did quite a bit of this, but this is alarming.
Before you know it, Microsoft will be getting billions of dollars in no bid contracts subsidized by tax payers when Linux or other competing software could have done the same job for less money, and the RIAA will have Obama’s ear and be writing even more US laws.
Did you know that if you are taping your son’s birthday party and there’s a song playing in the background, and you upload that clip to Youtube, that constitutes an infringement?
Surely they should be enforcing the Sherman Act as well, right?
AT&T got torn apart for doing far less to abuse the American public than Microsoft gets away with, and the last time I looked, the law they were tried under is still in effect.
Google & Apple Boards Investigated - Apple Blog
May 6th, 2009
at 8:56am
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