A US appeals court dismissed a lawsuit brought by multiple states against Meta’s Facebook, which accused the company of violating antitrust laws.
Led by New York, dozens of states appealed to the US Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia, seeking to revive the case that had been rejected by US District Judge James Boasberg. The judge ruled that the states had acted too late in filing their claims.
In 2020, both the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) and the states requested the court to mandate Facebook to divest its acquisitions of Instagram, purchased for $1 billion in 2012, and WhatsApp, acquired for $19 billion in 2014. The FTC’s lawsuit is still proceeding.
The appeals court, comprising a three-judge panel, unanimously concurred that the states had delayed excessively in initiating the lawsuit.
Circuit Judge A. Raymond Randolph emphasized that the states were aware of Facebook’s significant acquisitions, noting that both transactions received public scrutiny and were investigated by the FTC.
Neither the office of the New York attorney general nor representatives from Facebook provided immediate comments regarding the ruling.
Earlier this year, Meta achieved a legal victory when a judge declined the FTC’s request to block its acquisition of virtual reality content developer Within Unlimited, dismissing the agency’s concerns about potential reductions in competition within the emerging industry.
A trial slated for December aims to determine if Meta can proceed with this smaller acquisition, which the FTC views as a critical test of its strategy to prevent the company from monopolizing emerging markets by acquiring promising rival firms, particularly in the realms of virtual and augmented reality.
Judge Edward Davila from the US District Court for the Northern District of California stated that the FTC failed to adequately demonstrate that Meta would have entered the fitness content market without the ability to acquire Within.
© Thomson Reuters 2023
