Google’s $2.1 billion Fitbit acquisition wins conditional approval from the European competition commission- Technology News, Firstpost

TechSamvadDec 18, 2020 14:32:25 IST

Google’s $2.1 billion acquisition of wearable tech firm Fitbit earned the European Commission’s conditional approval, the Competition Commission mentioned in a press launch on 17 December 2020. It follows the Commission’s investigation into the firm’s promise to not use Fitbit customers’ well being knowledge for focused advertisements. Under the Commission’s situations, the search big cannot use the knowledge of EU Fitbit customers for promoting, it should keep a technical separation between Fitbit and Google knowledge, and ensure EU customers have a transparent selection about utilizing well being knowledge for different Google providers.

In approving the deal, Google has now agreed to numerous concessions to ease EU issues. Among the concessions, Google has agreed to not use Fitbit knowledge, together with GPS and well being knowledge, gathered from any consumer in the European Economic Area (EEA) for focused promoting.

Executive Vice-President Margrethe Vestager, in command of competition coverage, mentioned: “We can approve the proposed acquisition of Fitbit by Google because the commitments will ensure that the market for wearables and the nascent digital health space will remain open and competitive. The commitments will determine how Google can use the data collected for ad purposes, how interoperability between competing wearables and Android will be safeguarded and how users can continue to share health and fitness data, if they choose to.”