More the latter. Same thing happened with IBM: they were willing to let Microsoft retain the rights to MS-DOS because they were under antitrust scrutiny throughout all of the 70s.

Wow! Can you see what you’re arguing for here? A tech company under tight scrutiny has to give an opportunity for a smaller competitor to unlock incredible wealth beyond what the big tech firm could have done on its own.

/r/selfawarewolves

I'm not arguing for anything here. I'm explaining that the original commenter has it right: the result of this will be less innovation within a company under intense antitrust scrutiny (whether it be IBM, Microsoft, Google, or any other). Whether innovation happens elsewhere is a separate question. Personally I think it's pretty likely - it worked out for Microsoft and Google, after all - and probably would be a good thing over the long term, but there was also an "innovation desert" for ~4-5 years while the big incumbents were too scared to innovate or compete and yet the new startups were not big or wealthy enough to field an effective challenge.