European Union competition regulators have deepened their investigation into Broadcom following its sixty-one billion dollar acquisition of VMware, focusing on post-acquisition changes to licensing terms, software bundling, steep price increases, and interoperability restrictions. The heightened scrutiny comes after European trade associations formally requested urgent intervention, alleging that Broadcom’s restructuring of VMware software programs constitutes exploitative market abuse and threatens European cloud providers.(Bloomberg)
The probe recently sparked a major procedural battle over regulatory evidence and international legal professional privilege. Broadcom challenged an EU request for internal communications and sought to withhold documents created in the United States, arguing they were protected under American attorney-client privilege. European Union competition law, however, extends legal privilege strictly to communications with independent, EU-qualified external lawyers, excluding advice from in-house corporate counsel.
Broadcom and VMware filed a lawsuit before the EU General Court to block the document demand, but the court dismissed their application for interim relief. European judges ruled that the European Commission holds sole authority to decide what evidence is necessary for an antitrust probe, affirming that companies under investigation cannot filter internal records. While the General Court’s decision forces compliance with the evidentiary requests, Broadcom’s underlying lawsuit seeking full annulment of the information order remains pending.
