FTC, Meta renew battle in federal court over acquisition of VR fitness app maker Within

The Federal Trade Commission’s first major test in court against Big Tech under its crusading Chair Lina Khan begins in a Silicon Valley courtroom on Thursday in an attempt to block Meta Platforms Inc.’s $300 million acquisition of VR fitness app maker Within.

The FTC claims Facebook parent company Meta META, +1.54% will illegally extend its market power into the nascent metaverse market and that Meta “had the intentions to enter — and thus was a reasonably probable entrant into — the VR Dedicated Fitness App market,” according to a court filing. Conversely, Meta asserts “these ideas never proceeded beyond the discussion stage, never received approval from any senior manager, and were all discarded as impractical for various reasons,” in its filing.

A star-studded lineup of witnesses is expected during the trial, led by Meta Chief Executive Mark Zuckerberg, who is pivoting the company into a metaverse force; Meta Chief Technology Officer Andrew Bosworth, who is spearheading the company’s VR push; and Within founder Chris Milk.The FTC’s showdown with Meta could foreshadow even more aggressive action from Khan, who made her name in antitrust circles with a seminal paper on the market dominance of Amazon.com Inc. AMZN, +2.39%.

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