A British tribunal has rejected Britain’s competition regulator decision on Meta’s bid to acquire Giphy.
The ruling has forced the regulator to carry out another review of the bid.
Britain’s Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) last year ordered Meta to sell animated images platform Giphy, which it acquired for a reported $400 million.
The CMA ordered the sale of Giphy because of its concerns about a loss of a possible competitor in advertising, and the potential impact on social media rivals.
Last month, the U.S. tech giant partially won an appeal against the regulator, when Britain’s Competition Appeals Tribunal (CAT) said that the CMA had “failed properly to consult” and had “wrongly excised portions from its decision”.
The CAT said it had quashed the regulator’s ruling and referred the matter back for a new decision.
In response, the CMA said the tribunal had endorsed its approach to reviewing mergers that might harm innovation, but had agreed to reconsider its ruling.
