The Federal Trade Commission said in a staff report It was issued on Friday that there are potential issues of competition in the partnership between major technology companies and generative AI developers – in particular, Microsoft’s support of OpenAI and Amazon and Alphabet / Google’s partnership with Anthropic.

“The FTC report sheds light on how partnerships with big tech companies can create lock-in, deprive start-ups of important AI inputs, and reveal sensitive information that undermines fair competition,” said FTC Chair Lina Khan at a statement. (President-elect Donald Trump plans to replace Khan as chair.)

The report focuses on the roles of Microsoft, Amazon, and Google as cloud service providers working with OpenAI and Anthropic; among other things, it suggests that these partnerships may affect access to computing resources and engineering talent, increasing the cost of transfer for companies working with developers of AI, and can give cloud providers unique access to sensitive information.

Deputy general counsel of Microsoft, Rima Alaily Bloomberg said that the company’s partnership with OpenAI “has enabled one of the world’s most successful AI startups and inspired a wave of unprecedented technology investment and innovation in the industry.”