The EU’s investigation into Apple’s Shazam acquisition should reach a conclusion next month

Late last year, Apple announced plans to acquire Shazam, reportedly for as much as $400 million. However, it didn't take long for anti-trust complaints to begin rolling in here in Europe, with multiple countries requesting that the European Commission investigate the deal. The EU launched its investigation in early February, and today it is being reported that a decision will be made by the 23rd of April.

On the 7th of February, the European Commission announced plans to investigate the Apple-Shazam acquisition deal over fears that it could negatively impact competition. Multiple countries, including Spain, Austria, France and Iceland requested that the EU Commission investigate the deal before it goes through.

The goal is to investigate how much Apple's acquisition of Shazam could hurt local competing services in Europe and whether or not such a merger would be allowed under European law. Apple announced plans to acquire Shazam back in December, in an effort to bolster Apple Music and Siri with features from the well-known music discovery app.

According to a Reuters report, Apple sought the European Union's approval for the deal on Wednesday this week. Now, the EU has set itself a deadline for deciding whether or not the deal with go through. We should have a final answer by the 23rd of April.

Who would miss out if Apple did buy Shazam? Well Spotify is the biggest name that comes to mind. Currently, the Shazam app on iOS and Spotify serves links to both Spotify and Apple Music, both services receive quite a lot of traffic from the app. If Apple acquires Shazam, then those referrals to Spotify could be taken away, as the service could be absorbed entirely into the Apple ecosystem.

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KitGuru Says: The Shazam acquisition came out of the blue and seemed very sudden. However, it does make sense given that Shazam is already baked into Siri. Still, it looks like there could be cause for concern as far as competition goes. 

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