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Mark Zuckerberg, the CEO of Facebook parent company Meta, took the witness stand Tuesday in the FTC's effort to stop the tech giant from buying a virtual reality startup. At issue is whether Meta's acquisition of the small company that makes a VR fitness app called Supernatural will hurt competition in the emerging virtual reality market. If the deal is allowed to go through, the Federal Trade Commission argues, it would violate antitrust laws and dampen innovation, hurting consumers who may face higher prices and fewer options outside platforms controlled by Meta Platforms Inc. The case, expected to wrap up Tuesday, is being heard by U.S. District Judge Edward Davila, who also oversaw the trial of disgraced Theranos founder Elizabeth Holmes and her partner Ramesh Sunny Balwani. Both were sentenced to over a decade in prison for their roles in the company's blood-testing hoax.
Mergers & acquisitions started off on a strong footing, hitting a four-year high at USD 30.3 billion in the first quarter of 2022, bucking the global trend where deal-making fell sharply, says a report. Deal activity grew by 5.6 per cent in value terms in January-March 2022 compared to the first quarter of 2021, making it the highest first-quarter period since 2018 when it was USD 31.1 billion. In volume terms, the M&A activity grew 29.6 per cent in the first quarter of 2022, making it the best-ever quarterly number, according to the M&A numbers collated by Refinitiv, an LSEG business, which is among the world's largest providers of financial markets data and infrastructure. M&As involving domestic companies stood at USD 23.7 billion, down 8.3 per cent on year. Domestic M&As declined 24.5 per cent to USD 12.1 billion, and inbound M&As grew by 17.9 per cent to USD 11.6 billion, which is the highest first-quarter period since 2017. The US was the most active ...