Google’s acquisition of Fitbit hits a stumbling block in Australia

Last year, Google announced their plans to acquire Fitbit. So far the proceedings to formalize the acquisition is moving along rather nicely, with the EU signing off on it. Unfortunately, it appears that over in Australia, Google has hit a stumbling block that could delay the acquisition process.

The Australian Competition and Consumer Commission has rejected an offer by Google in which the company says that they will make it legally binding so that it limits the data that they acquire from its wearables. Instead, the consumer watchdog group says that they will conduct their own investigation.

They also suggest that if Google acquires fitbit before the ACCC’s investigation is concluded, it could result in Google being hit with heavy fines as much as $400 million, which is roughly 10% of the company’s annual turnover in Australia. According to a Google spokesman who issued a statement regarding the ACCC’s decision:

“We have been working constructively with regulators around the world to close the acquisition of Fitbit and to start building new helpful devices for users. This deal has always been about devices, not data, and we are committed to protecting Fitbit users’ privacy.”

The ACCC is expected to make a decision before the 25th of March, which means that Google has to wait a maximum of about 3 months before it can all be finalized.

Source: The Guardian