During the hearing that took place in the early morning of July 30, Zuckerberg was repeatedly asked by lawmakers about his decision to spend $1 billion to buy Instagram in 2012. He wore a formal suit and chose a neutral white background.
Congressman Joe Neguse mentioned an internal email from Zuckerberg obtained by the Judiciary Committee, in which the Facebook CEO announced that an agreement had been reached to merge the photo application Instagram.
`One reason people underestimate the importance of following Google is that we can always just buy any competing startup. But it will take more time before we can buy Google
Zuckerberg replied that he did not remember anything about this email, but the content `sounded like a joke`.
Mark Zuckerberg participated in the hearing remotely.
Meanwhile, congressman Pramila Jayapal questioned: `In a conversation, you told Systrom that Facebook is building its own strategy on photos and the company will decide whether the relationship with Instagram is a partner or a competitor.`
According to her, Kevin Systrom, co-founder of Instagram, understood it as a threat and expressed concern to an investor that Zuckerberg would activate `destruction mode` if he did not agree to sell this application.
In another email, Facebook described Instagram as a threat, so instead of competing, they decided to spend money to buy it.
Similarly, congressman Joe Neguse commented on the 2014 WhatsApp merger for $19 billion: `Over the past few years, Facebook has used its market power to acquire, or copy, competitors.
If counted as a country, Facebook is the most populous country in the world with 2.6 billion users as of the first quarter of 2020.
The technology world is concerned that the `buy to destroy` strategy – acquiring and destroying potential competitors before they can grow – of technology giants will kill competition.
Chau An