As part of the Trump administration’s strategy to solidify American supremacy in the field of artificial intelligence, U.S. antitrust authorities are cautious against anticompetitive practices in the field, a Department of Justice official stated in New York on Thursday.
Assistant Attorney General Gail Slater stated at a seminar at Fordham University that protecting competition in the business promotes innovation, indicating that President Donald Trump’s antitrust enforcers are on the lookout for anticompetitive conduct and consolidation.
The competitive dynamics of each tier of the AI stack and how they interact, with a particular focus on exclusionary behavior that prevents access to crucial inputs and distribution channels, are acceptable grounds for antitrust investigation, she stated.
One area the DOJ will keep an eye on is data access, Slater stated. To increase competition with its online search engine, a Washington judge recently ordered Alphabet’s Google to disclose some of its search data with rivals, including AI companies. According to Google, it will be appealed.
According to Slater, the need for data may lead to vertical integration—a merger or business combination between corporations and their suppliers—particularly in sectors where downstream organizations may have access to sensitive and important data, such as healthcare data.
According to her, we may also witness a growing trend of transactions being driven by the need to get data or deny competitors access to it.
According to Slater, open source AI models may increase competitiveness, which is something that Trump’s AI action plan envisioned as a means of disseminating American technology.
“A truly open-source model, of course, must not be one that is unilaterally maintained by a single vendor that imposes restrictions and exerts unwarranted influence,” she added.
During President Joe Biden’s administration, antitrust officials questioned Big Tech’s alliances with AI companies and voiced similar worries about AI competition.
