In a statement Meta Platforms Inc said, it had closed its acquisition of U.S. customer service startup Kustomer, after gaining antitrust approval from the European Commission last month.

The acquisition was announced in November 2020 but got delayed due to regulatory scrutiny including a full-scale investigation from the European Commission.

Meta secured the European Commissin’s approval after agreeing to provide rivals free access to its messaging channels for 10 years.

Kustomer sells CRM software to businesses so they can communicate with consumers by phone, email, text messages, WhatsApp, Instagram and other channels.

The acquisition is likely to help Facebook scale up its instant-messaging app WhatsApp, whose usage has soared during the COVID-19 pandemic.

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Tags: acquisition, antitrust, approval, CRM software, customer service startup, EU, European Commission, investigation, Kustomer, M&A, merger, Meta Platforms Inc, regulatory scrutiny