The German Federal Cartel Office (Bundeskartellamt) has approved the proposed acquisition of Confluent, Inc. by International Business Machines Corporation (IBM), concluding that the transaction does not raise significant competition concerns. The decision was published on 9 February 2026 following an in-depth review of the merger.
IBM and Confluent are both US-based companies active in the information technology sector. IBM is a global provider of enterprise IT solutions, including software, servers, storage systems, cloud and artificial intelligence offerings, as well as IT implementation and consulting services. Confluent is a leading supplier of Event Stream Processing (ESP) software, which enables the real-time aggregation and processing of data from applications, databases and machines, and is increasingly used in artificial intelligence applications.
Competition Assessment
According to the Federal Cartel Office, the parties will continue to operate in dynamic and highly competitive markets following the merger. In particular, the authority found no indication that the transaction would give IBM and Confluent the ability to foreclose competitors, for example through product bundling or exclusionary discount strategies.
Commenting on the decision, Andreas Mundt, President of the Federal Cartel Office, stated:
“Our review has shown that IBM and Confluent will continue to operate in dynamic and highly competitive markets in the event streaming sector even after the merger. The merger does not give the companies any leeway that would allow them to drive competitors out of the market.”
The investigation confirmed Confluent’s strong market position in ESP software but also identified several effective competitors, including Ververica, Redpanda, StreamNative and Aiven. In addition, the authority noted that, for certain customer groups, cloud-based offerings from large hyperscalers and in-house deployments of the open-source solution Apache Kafka—which constitutes the underlying industry standard for ESP—remain competitively relevant.
IBM was not considered a close competitor to Confluent in the ESP market. While there is some overlap between the companies’ customer bases, the Federal Cartel Office concluded that the merger would not enable IBM to significantly tie customers to Confluent, raise prices, or exclude competing providers. Market participants did not identify relevant product-related complementarities that could give rise to anticompetitive effects, and a significant share of ESP users are not IBM customers.
Transaction Background and Strategic Rationale
Under the terms of the transaction, announced on 8 December 2025, IBM will acquire all outstanding shares of Confluent for $31 per share in cash, corresponding to an enterprise value of approximately $11 billion. The acquisition will be financed using IBM’s available cash and is expected to close by mid-2026, subject to remaining regulatory approvals and customary closing conditions.
IBM has described the acquisition as a strategic fit with its hybrid cloud and AI strategy. Confluent’s real-time data streaming platform, built on the open-source Apache Kafka technology, is designed to connect, process and govern data in motion across complex IT environments, which is increasingly critical for the deployment of generative and agentic AI.
IBM expects the transaction to generate significant product and commercial synergies across its AI, automation, data and consulting offerings. The company has also stated that the acquisition is expected to be accretive to adjusted EBITDA within the first full year following closing and to free cash flow in the second year.
Confluent, which is headquartered in Mountain View, California, serves more than 6,500 customers across major industries, including over 40% of the Fortune 500. The company partners with a broad ecosystem of technology providers and hyperscalers, consistent with IBM’s open and collaborative approach to enterprise technology.
With the approval of the German Federal Cartel Office, the transaction clears an important regulatory hurdle, confirming that the merger is unlikely to restrict competition in the evolving market for real-time data and event streaming solutions.