Facebook Internal Memo on Rivals Undercuts Antitrust Defense
Facebook's parent company insists that its social-networking and messaging services have dozens of outside rivals, but an internal memo reveals that Meta Platforms Inc.'s top executives were more worried about the threat posed by its own products.
The memo, written in October 2018 for Chief Executive Officer Mark Zuckerberg and other executives, maps out the company's growth strategies. It outlines ways to prevent Instagram and WhatsApp, acquired by Facebook in 2012 and 2014 respectively, from cannibalizing Facebook's trajectory.
The memo figured prominently in a congressional inquiry into competitive practices across the technology industry that focused on some of the biggest companies, including Meta's Facebook. The House Judiciary antitrust subcommittee released the memo Tuesday for the first time in its entirety as part of its final report on competition in digital markets.
The memo, which Meta turned over voluntarily, helped shape the antitrust panel's crafting of proposed antitrust legislation that would affect the company, according to a person familiar with the matter who was granted anonymity to discuss non-public deliberations. One of those measures could be voted on by Congress as soon as next week.
The American Innovation and Choice Online Act would force Meta to provide the same level of access to its platforms that its own products have –- for example, increasing the ability of users to cross-post or import contacts to other social networks.
Christopher Sgro, a Meta spokesman, noted that the memo wasn't new and was turned over to the House panel. “The full record confirms what we have said from the beginning of these proceedings -- that we operate in a highly competitive space, and our acquisitions have been
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