Data key to Microsoft's proposed €23bn acquisition of LinkedIn

Any probe into Microsoft’s proposed $26.2bn (€23.2bn) acquisition of professional social network LinkedIn, announced early last week, is likely to focus on the tie-up’s potential to leverage vast amounts of user data, the EU’s anti-competitive chief said yesterday.

The European Commission would look at whether “the data purchased in the deal has a very long durability and might constitute a barrier for others, or if they can be replicated so that others stand a chance to enter the market,” said Margrethe Vestager.

“We’ve done that kind of analysis in the past and it’s something we’re generally paying a lot of attention to,” she said in an interview in Copenhagen yesterday.