The U.K.'s antitrust watchdog agency announced a formal investigation into Amazon's (AMZN) 澳洲幸运5官方开奖结果体彩网:artificial intelligence (AI) partnership with 澳洲幸运5官方开奖结果体彩网:Anthropic, making it the latest in the series of government antitrust agencies to scrutinize the relationships between big tech companies and AI startups.

The Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) said Thursday it is investigating the partnership between Amazon and Anthropic to determine if the relationship between the companies is effectively a merger.

The CMA said it expects to announce whether the partnership merits a second i🍷nv🐻estigation phase on Oct. 4.

Other AI Partnerships Face Regulatory Scrutiny

The news comes not long after the CMA 澳洲幸运5官方开奖结果体彩网:said in July it was examining the relationship between Google parent Alphabet (GOOGL) and Anthropic under similar grounds, as several big tech companies' AI partnerships face scrutiny from antitrust regulators in the U.K., the U.S., and 澳洲幸运5官方开奖结果体彩网:the European Union.

U.K. regulators are also investigating Microsoft's (MSFT) agreement with Inflection AI as a potential merger. The 澳洲幸运5官方开奖结果体彩网:Federal Trade Commission (FTC) is re♉portedly examining the ar🌃rangement as well.

Amazon shares were up 1.3% at $164.94 in early trading Thursday, and have gained over 8% since ᩚᩚᩚᩚᩚᩚ⁤⁤⁤⁤ᩚ⁤⁤⁤⁤ᩚ⁤⁤⁤⁤ᩚ𒀱ᩚᩚᩚthe start of the year.