Dominant players extend power and influence over the explosion of game-changing technologies. Who will keep them in check?

Updated: July 18, 2025 | Includes the proposed ServiceNow-Moveworks deal and updated info on the proposed Google-Wiz merger.

Does anybody remember Napster? Launched in June 1999, the revolutionary peer-to-peer music sharing platform peaked at 80 million music lovers worldwide. It famously fell from greatness into bankruptcy three years later after being found liable for mass copyright infringement. In March of this year, after several years of languishing in obscurity and thanks to the tech world’s sweeping embrace of artificial intelligence, Napster has been given corporate defibrillation.

Immersive 3D tech company, Infinite Reality, flush from a $3 billion funding round, bought Napster for $207 million, then quickly paid $500 million for Touchcast to bolster its Generative AI and immersive technologies capabilities. This is just one in a long string of AI-related deals in recent years with billions of dollars of venture capital flowing in the background.

When it comes to absorbing nascent AI companies, Alphabet (Google), Amazon, Apple, Meta (Facebook), and Microsoft (“Big Four”) lead the way, along with Cisco, IBM, and Intel which also have concluded multi-billion-dollar deals. Adobe, NVIDIA, OpenAI, Oracle, Qualcomm, Salesforce, and UBER are in the billion-dollar club, as well.

The aggressively competitive tactics of some of these companies have drawn unwanted but often deserved heat. They have sparked criticism from consumer groups and legislators; investigations and fines by global competition authorities; litigation from agencies, companies, and consumers; and government-mandated breakups and divestitures. In some cases, their acquisitions have run into government roadblocks, particularly in the U.S., EU, and UK. Pair this history with the tectonic effects of AI – and the promise it shows to change how the world gathers, processes, analyzes, and creates data – and you have an area that screams for the scrutiny of antitrust enforcers and litigators.

The M&A Landscape

The Center for Security and Emerging Technology (CSET) analyzed 4,354 transactions compiled by corporate financial publisher PitchBook. CSET concluded that transactions involving AI companies more than doubled during the last decade, from 225 in 2014 to 494 in 2023. CSET reported 828 transactions in 2021. “The proportion of total M&A transactions in which non-AI companies acquired AI companies grew from 10 percent in 2014 to 45 percent in 2023,” CSET found, although most of these acquisitions were conducted by companies in the technology industry. While the incumbent tech companies are the big buyers, A.I. M&A activity remains “fairly diffuse, with 1,446 unique acquirers engaging in AI M&A transactions over the past decade.”

“In U.S. cross-border AI acquisitions,” CSET continued, “American firms have purchased 503 foreign AI companies, while foreign firms have bought 271 American AI companies. U.S. firms most frequently acquired AI firms based in the United Kingdom and Canada. Firms in the United Kingdom and Canada were also the most frequent foreign acquirers of U.S. AI companies.”

Private equity is fueling much of the development of AI, infusing more than $1 trillion into the technology, supporting data centers, and other pieces of the information technology infrastructure in 2020, according to a March 2025 article posted by the American Investment Council (AIC). “From strengthening cybersecurity to powering semiconductor and datacenter development, private equity firms are supplying the capital and expertise that companies need to remain as the leader of innovation in this global digital transformation race,” the AIC said.

It was private equity that enabled Infinite Reality to purchase Napster and then Touchcast, which partners with Microsoft. Touchcast and Microsoft have their sights on building an “AI Superhighway.” Infinite Reality explains that Touchcast is “built on OpenAI and delivered on Microsoft Azure via a $50 million strategic partnership that provides a suite of AI delivery systems to improve response times.” The delivery of AI services via cloud services is a reason for a healthy pace of collaboration and aggressive acquisition strategies in the overlapping AI/Cloud space.

Meanwhile, the California Law Review Commission has been studying and recommending changes to California antitrust law, as one of its working groups focuses on AI and clouds, and the dominant players in that arena. “The U.S. cloud market is dominated by three major players,” the group writes, “Amazon Web Services (31% market share), Microsoft Azure (25%), and Google Cloud (11%), collectively holding 67% of the market. Smaller firms like IBM, Oracle, Salesforce, and Alibaba Cloud make up the rest, with the market’s concentration level just below the threshold for being highly concentrated.”

“Between 2005 and 2023, major cloud providers and AI-specialized firms like Qualcomm, Meta, Intel, NVidia, and Genesys made nearly 280 AI-related acquisitions,” according to the AI working group. “Activity increased around 2011 and peaked in 2018-2019, marking a distinct cycle of AI expansion that followed the peak acquisition activity of first-generation digital ecosystems in 2014-2015.”

A.I. Acquisitions Table

In this interactive table we pick up from the “peak acquisition activity” period with many noteworthy acquisitions and investments dating back to 2012. We welcome additions or corrections.

Commentary

These acquisitions highlight the significant and routine nature of investments made by major tech companies, large service providers, and private equity to acquire AI technology, integrate it into existing services, and launch new ventures. In fact, it appears to be the leading strategy for building corporate leadership in this arena. Diana L. Moss and David Hummel of the Progressive Policy Institute wrote in 2022 that digital ecosystems grow mostly through acquisitions (Anticipating the Next Generation of Powerful Digital Players: Implications for Competition Policy, Am. Antitrust Inst., Jan. 18, 2022). (Moss is also participating in the California Law Review Commission antitrust project.)

Acquisition of AI tech gives existing corporate giants even more power in their respective markets and even greater control over much of the world’s data, potentially at the expense of consumers, innovation, and fair market competition. Rapid acquisition also means that while innovation abounds, it offers a quicker and more available path for large corporate players. That means smaller firms are doing a lot of innovation’s heavy lifting or, unable to compete or get acquired, they get shut out.

Policymakers, regulators, enforcers, and antitrust attorneys have much to tackle during this whirlwind of technology advancement and business dealing. Not only should antitrust watchdogs monitor this industry, but so should national security agencies. The AI goldrush is likely to further consolidate the collection, creation, and control of data among these already data-rich and powerful global Goliaths. We fail to keep them in check at our peril.

Edited by Tom Hagy for Mogin Law LLP.