The U.S. has started an antitrust review of Amazon’s plan to buy iRobot, a company that makes vacuums.
People familiar with the situation told Politico on Friday that the U.S. Federal Trade Commission has started looking into Amazon.com’s (NASDAQ:AMZN) $1.7 billion purchase of iRobot (NASDAQ:IRBT) Corp., a company that makes robot vacuums, to see if the deal breaks antitrust law.
The U.S. antitrust body’s review of iRobot will cover a lot of ground. A report said it will look at both head-to-head competition and whether the deal would illegally increase Amazon’s market share in the connected device market and the retail market in general.
Amazon wouldn’t say anything, and iRobot and the FTC didn’t answer right away when Reuters asked them.
The online shopping giant has steadily added more Alexa-enabled speakers and home security doorbells and cameras from Ring, which it bought in 2018.
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Amazon said in August that it would pay $61 per share in cash to buy iRobot, the company that makes the Roomba robot vacuum cleaner.
The biggest online store in the world is trying to grow its selection of smart home devices. It is also trying to grow its virtual healthcare and add doctors’ offices for the first time.
In July, the online store agreed to buy the primary care company, One Medical.
One Medical said on Friday that the U.S. antitrust body had asked the company and Amazon for more information about Amazon’s plan to buy the primary care provider for $3.49 billion.
