Open Markets Urges European Commission to Investigate Google’s Wiz Acquisition on Cloud Monoply Concerns

BRUSSELS - Open Markets Institute, alongside partner organisations Article 19, the Balanced Economy Project and SOMO, made a detailed submission to the European Commission urging officials to open an in-depth investigation into Google’s proposed acquisition of the cloud security firm Wiz.

The proposed takeover raises serious and far-reaching competition concerns:

By acquiring Wiz, a leading independent, multi-cloud security control layer, Google — itself a hyperscale cloud provider — would gain the ability to control a critical layer of the cloud security stack. This would create strong incentives and mechanisms to foreclose rivals in both cloud services and cloud security markets, generating significant risks of conglomerate effects and long-term ecosystem entrenchment.

Following the merger, Google would have both the ability and the incentive to engage in “soft degradation” of rival cloud and cloud security services. This could occur through deeper integration of Wiz into Google Cloud Platform (GCP), strategic bundling practices, and the exploitation of Wiz data across Google’s wider ecosystem. Such conduct would risk raising customers’ switching costs, increasing dependency on Google’s services, and reducing competitive choice.

The transaction also threatens to dampen innovation in cloud security. The loss of Wiz as an independent, multi-cloud provider would weaken competitive pressure on hyperscalers and further disadvantage smaller firms, which already face high barriers to competing effectively in cloud and cloud security markets.

The proposed acquisition also poses serious risks to the resilience of the European economy: Cloud computing and cloud security services now constitute essential digital infrastructure across a wide range of sectors. Europe’s growing reliance on a small number of powerful cloud providers amplifies the systemic risks associated with disruption or failure in this infrastructure. Market structure — and control over critical layers of cloud and cloud security — is therefore directly relevant to economic resilience.

Integrating Wiz’s independent security services into Google’s tightly integrated ecosystem risks undermining the reliability, continuity and responsiveness of cloud services. The European Commission should assess the impact of the transaction on these non-price parameters, not merely on pricing or short-term efficiencies.

In light of these concerns, the submission calls on the European Commission’s Directorate-General for Competition (DG COMP) to initiate a Phase II, in-depth investigation.

“This is not a routine merger,” said Open Markets Europe Director Max von Thun. “The complex technical, non-price and systemic effects at stake cannot be reliably assessed within a Phase I review or addressed through standard commitments. A full investigation is necessary to gather sufficient evidence, particularly given the central role cloud services play in the core functions of the European economy."

The full submission can be read here.

Open Markets has conductive extensive research on the dangers of market concentration in cloud, including through the publication of a major report : Engineering the Cloud Commons: Tackling Monopoly Control of Critical Digital Infrastructure.