The UK competition regulator has announced it has sufficient reason to officially launch an investigation into the anticipated £2.9bn merger of Shutterstock and Getty Images.
The Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) said in June it was inviting comments regarding the deal to determine if the proposed acquisition could be harmful to the competitiveness of the UK stock image market.
The regulator has concluded there is enough risk associated with the transaction to officially begin an investigation, which will determine how much scrutiny the deal will face.
The CMA will commence its phase 1 investigation next week on Tuesday 26 August, with an initial deadline to announce its decision set for 20 October.
Should the CMA find there is legitimate concern over whether the deal could be harmful to both smaller stock image providers and UK consumers, it will progress to a phase 2 investigation.
Getty Images first announced its plans to acquire Shutterstock in January. As two of the largest players in the industry, a combined entity would control an enormous portion of the stock image market.
The merger would also combine the vast stores of digital images and videos used by the two firms in their bespoke generative AI tools, used to create new images based on their respective libraries.
The joint entity would hold an incredibly expansive library of content that would give a significant advantage in the AI image generation market.