India OKs Facebook Subsidiary’s Acquisition Of Jio Platforms Share

The Competition Commission of India (CCI) has given the green light to the acquisition of a roughly 9.99 percent share of Jio Platforms by a newly formed subsidiary of Facebook called Jaadhu Holdings LLC. CCI said Jaadhu is a wholly-owned Facebook subsidiary, which was started in March of this year under Delaware state laws, according to a press release.

Jio Platforms owns and runs digital applications as well as possesses controlling investments in some entities. It also has all of Reliance Jio Infocomm Limited’s (RJIL) outstanding and issued share capital. RJIL is a licensed operator of communications systems, which services customers throughout India.

In April, news surfaced that Facebook closed a deal for a minority share in Reliance Jio, which would provide the social media platform with a bigger presence in India.

“This investment underscores our commitment to India and our excitement for the dramatic transformation that Jio has spurred in the country,” Facebook Vice President and Managing Director for India Ajit Mohan and Chief Revenue Officer David Fischer said in a Facebook blog post at the time.

But earlier in June, news surfaced that the CCI was probing Facebook’s acquisition of the stake in the digital assets of digital assets. Ashok Kumar Gupta, the chairman of the commission, said per reports that the panel’s function is to stop the misuse of information from occurring in all of the arrangements that it evaluates.

The job of the CCI is to uphold the Competition Act of India that forbids agreements that go against competition and corporations’ abuse of a leading standing as well as regulate mergers and acquisitions in addition to any kind of activity that could stymie competition in the country.

Gupta had said to the newswire that regulators were also mulling if new standards should be a part of its evaluation as some M&As fall outside of the minimums for scrutiny even is possible harm is evident.