Amazon looks likely to get unconditional antitrust approval from the European Union (EU) for its acquisition of iRobot. Reuters reported the news after speaking to three people familiar with the proceedings.
The European Commission is the body looking into Amazon’s acquisition to see if it will affect competition in the robot vacuum cleaners segment. It will give its final verdict on Saint Valentine’s Day - February 14, but has not commented on Reuter’s findings.
Amazon has been extremely interested in pushing its smart home device and it’s easy to see how the iRobot vacuums will tie into this. One of the things about Amazon products is their low prices, it will be interesting to see if Amazon can get the cost of iRobot vacuums down too because they’re not the cheapest items around.
Reuters noted that the UK antitrust agency, the Competition and Markets Authority, unconditionally allowed the acquisition after just a preliminary review. Given that these important regulators have given the go ahead it looks like Amazon shouldn’t run into any problems.
The iRobot Roomba is already a well-established brand and has been around for quite a while at this point. If you’ve seen a robot vacuum, there is a good chance that it was a Roomba model.
If you are interested in picking up a Roomba vacuum, it’s worth mentioning that Neowin published a deal recently as the Roomba 694 is now available for just $159. You can check out the article here if you’re interested.
Once Amazon acquires iRobot, the automated vacuums will accompany other smart devices including Ring doorbells, the Echo smart speakers and displays, air quality monitors, smart lighting devices, and more.
People often speak about the Apple ecosystem but it looks like Amazon is looking to become the one-stop-shop for all things smart home. Several years ago when it launched the Alexa speakers, Google released its Google Home devices to compete but it really doesn’t have the breadth of devices that Amazon offers.
Source: Reuters
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