IBM gains unconditional EU approval for USD 34 billion Red Hat deal

US tech giant International Business Machines Corp on Thursday won unconditional EU antitrust approval for its USD 34 billion acquisition of software company Red Hat.

IBM is looking to the deal, its biggest to date, to expand its subscription-based software offerings to counter falling software sales and declining demand for mainframe servers.

The European Commission said in a statement that it had concluded the transaction would raise no competition concerns. Reuters reported on June 19 that the deal would get the go-ahead.