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DOJ Seeks Info On Salesforce’s $27B Slack Deal

By  |  February 17, 2021

The US Justice Department’s Antitrust Division has asked Salesforce and Slack for more information ahead of Salesforce’s plan to buy the smaller software company for US$27 billion, reported CNBC.

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    The development could indicate greater scrutiny into prominent technology transactions under the Biden Administration.

    Even with the additional layer of evaluation, Salesforce still expects to close its deal for Slack in the quarter that ends on July 31, according to a regulatory filing.

    The review, known as a second request, is not unprecedented: GE’s 2017 Baker Hughes acquisition, Charles Schwab’s 2020 TD Ameritrade deal and Anheuser-Busch’s 2020 transactionwith Craft Brew Alliance, which involved the sale of Kona Brewing’s Hawaii operations to another company, all faced similar requests.

    There are signs the US might take a stronger approach to antitrust enforcement than it did under Barack Obama, CNBC reported in January. In Congress, Amy Klobuchar, a Democrat from Minnesota who became chair of the Senate’s Judiciary subcommittee on antitrust this month, has proposed a sweeping reform of antitrust enforcement.

    “We’ve appreciated our constructive dialogue with the Department of Justice and look forward to it continuing,” a Salesforce spokesperson told CNBC in an email. “We strongly believe this transaction will be transformative for customers and the industry and will enable companies to grow and succeed in this all-digital, work-from-anywhere world.”