Microsoft now has the go-ahead of the European Commission for its $19.7 billion bid to buy Nuance Communications, but it will still have to wait for the UK Competition and Marketing Authority’s approval before the deal can go ahead.
European Union (EU) granted unconditional approval, stating it “would raise no competition concerns” and found that “Microsoft and Nuance offer very different products.” This is seen as a major step toward finalising the deal, which has already been approved by the United States and Australia.
In its finding, the regulators said: “Nuance is a transcription software company with a strong focus on the healthcare sector and customer engagement solutions. Microsoft is a global technology company, which offers productivity and business software, cloud computing, and personal computing.
“Based on its market investigation, the Commission found that the transaction, as notified, would not significantly reduce competition in the transcription software, cloud services, enterprise communication services, customer relationship management, productivity software and PC operating systems markets.”
On 13 December, the UK’s Competition and Markets Authority said it would investigate the transaction. With the regulator accepting public comments until January 10th, 2022, it’s unlikely the deal will close by the end of 2021 as Microsoft had said it would when it first announced its intention to buy Nuance.
In April this year, Microsoft announced acquisition of Nuance Communications with an aim of enhancing its cloud and artificial intelligence offerings for healthcare customers.
The deal is to buy Nuance for $56 per share – a premium of 23% – in an all-cash transaction and will be Microsoft’s second-largest acquisition after the LinkedIn purchase in 2016 for $26.2 billion.
At the time of announcing the acquisition, Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella had said: “Nuance provides the AI layer at the healthcare point of delivery and is a pioneer in the real-world application of enterprise AI.
“AI is technology’s most important priority, and healthcare is its most urgent application. Together, with our partner ecosystem, we will put advanced AI solutions into the hands of professionals everywhere to drive better decision-making and create more meaningful connections as we accelerate growth of Microsoft Cloud in Healthcare and Nuance.”
