The European Commission yesterday ruled the acquisition would not significantly impede effective competition.
The Commission examined the effects that the proposed merger would have on the business analytics sector and its various sub-divisions.
“In each instance, the Commission found that the horizontal overlap between the parties' activities would not give rise to competition concerns, since the parties' combined market share would be moderate,” the Commission said in a statement.
“The combined IBM/Cognos entity would continue to face several strong competitors and customers would find sufficient alternative suppliers of such software products,” it said.
The Commission's investigation found no significant risk that the merged entity would be able to close off competitors from the market.
IBM's and Cognos' positions in their respective segments of enterprise application software (EAS) would not provide sufficient incentives to prevent standalone business analytics software vendors from integrating with their EAS platforms.
The acquisition is expected to be completed during the current quarter. Cognos employs 4,000 people globally and generated revenue last year of just under US$1 billion.
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