The Justice Department approved Google’s purchase of ticketing software company ITA Software as long as ITA’s products remain available to Google’s rivals.
The Justice Department said Friday that Google would be required to license the software, to continue to upgrade it and to establish firewalls to hide ITA clients’ proprietary software — which ITA can see — to protect their intellectual property.
Google, the world’s No. 1 Internet search engine, said in July that it would buy ITA Software for $700 million in cash. The announcement sparked concerns that travel websites such as Kayak and TripAdvisor could be deprived of ITA’s software.
