June 29, 2025

Welcome to Letters from CAMP, a newsletter on anti-monopoly activity in Canada and abroad, brought to you by the Canadian Anti-Monopoly Project. In this instalment we have:

• In a new piece for the Globe, CAMP’s Curtis McCord argues that digital sovereignty is national sovereignty
• Cohere’s Aidan Gomez says company is “not for sale” amid Big Tech buying spree
• Trump’s FTC continues to disappoint by giving corporations the greenlight for bullying behaviour

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Now let’s dive in.

McCord: Digital Sovereignty Key to Preserving National Security

Canada’s increasingly tenuous relationship with the United States has forced a rethink across long-settled areas of policy, and national security is no exception. Prime Minister Carney has made it clear that one of his primary goals is to diversify Canada’s defence base away from the current overreliance on American firms. Today, nearly three quarters of Canada’s defence capital spending heads down south. Taken for granted for decades, this arrangement looks naïve amid ongoing U.S. belligerence towards Canada.

But in the Globe this week, CAMP policy analyst Curtis McCord argues that for these diversification efforts to truly protect Canada, Carney’s focus must extend to our dependence on the U.S. for our critical digital infrastructure.

Our digital world is dominated by US firms, with players like Google, Amazon, Apple, Meta, and Microsoft controlling a dominant share of key markets such as online advertising, computing infrastructure and services, and increasingly artificial intelligence. Our economy, social lives, and even government services depend on access to digital infrastructure. If access to these resources were disrupted or otherwise leveraged against Canadians, their monopolization means we would have limited alternatives to fall back on.

Accordingly, a national security strategy focused on maintaining Canadian sovereignty must include consideration for digital sovereignty – the need for nation states to have a degree of control over their digital capacity. For a government focused on nation-building and forging a new path for Canada in an uncertain world, securing our digital infrastructure must be part of the conversation.

📰CAMP in the News📰

• Bester, A Tech Anti-Monopoly and Accountability Agenda for Canada (Tech Policy Press)

Cohere Co-founder: Canadian AI Leader “Not for Sale”

The digital sovereignty conversation in Canada has been an important reminder that who owns what matters, whether at the international or local level. But when it comes to companies, especially in the start-up space, the desire to maintain ownership is in tension with the financial rewards that come with being bought out by a larger firm. That’s why CAMP was glad to hear Cohere co-founder Aidan Gomez confirm this week that the Canadian AI leader is “not for sale.”

There are many reasons to care about the acquisition of start-ups by dominant incumbents. But one cause for concern is the innovation that may be lost when these aspiring companies are acquired by established players. In a new study, researchers at the OECD found that after start-ups are acquired by incumbents, their innovative activity declines with no corresponding increase in innovation by the acquirer. Companies hungry to steal share from competitors or create new markets are more likely to invest in R&D and create new products, services, and business models. Once they’re a part of a Big Tech mothership, that desire to innovate comes into conflict with the incentives and bureaucracy of the larger organization.

The need to foster independent companies at home must be balanced with vigilance that ensures we aren’t just propping up new versions of home-grown monopolists. Canada needs entrepreneurs that want to build at home, but making Canada’s economy diverse, competitive, and fair means supporting a variety of ownership structures for business. These include cooperatives and employee ownership models supported by our colleagues at Social Capital Partners.

Cohere’s success to date shows what many of us already know: it is possible to create great companies in Canada. That those companies have a desire to stay and grow in Canada is key to both reinforcing our sovereignty as well as building a fair and competitive economy.

📚What We’re Reading📚

• Bednar, Building Canada Requires Competition (Betakit)
• Ling, From flights to cellphone bills, Canadians get a raw deal. This is why — and how Mark Carney can fix it (Toronto Star)
• Van Voris, Visa Bid to Throw Out US Antitrust Case Denied as ‘Premature’ (Bloomberg)

Trump’s FTC Continues to Roll Over for Big Business

Despite enforcement efforts against Big Tech, Trump’s Federal Trade Commission (FTC) continues to disappoint. In a piece this week for Washington Monthly, anti-monopoly expert Ron Knox lays out how the decision to abandon an important price discrimination suit against PepsiCo shows that the enforcer is giving up on fair markets.

Price discrimination, businesses charging different prices for the same product, is something we’re all familiar with. What may be less familiar is the power of price discrimination to distort competition and punish small businesses to the benefit of dominant players. That’s exactly what RF Buche, owner of a small chain of rural grocery stores in South Dakota, told the FTC was happening. While Buche was paying $8.52 USD for 12 cans of Pepsi, big chains like Dollar General were able to sell the same product for $5 USD, a price they literally could not compete with.

By negotiating deals that no other retailer can access, price discrimination lets monopolists like PepsiCo, Walmart and Loblaws flex and consolidate their power over the supply chain. As Knox notes, Walmart (much like Amazon) rose to prominence using these tactics, leveraging buying power to drive supplier consolidation, gutting small businesses and markets across America. The U.S. has had laws against this practice for nearly 100 years. But they had gone unenforced since the Reagan era, until Lina Khan took the helm at the FTC and brought the case against PepsiCo.

The FTC giving up on this case is another sign that the monopolists are back at the helm of important American antitrust agencies. While the U.S. has robust state-level and private enforcement of its antitrust laws to make up the slack, the FTC’s abandonment of this important case is a blow to efforts to restore fair markets at home and abroad.

If you have any monopoly tips or stories you’d like to share, drop us a line at hello@antimonopoly.ca

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