- Reports have surfaced in the press about a U.S. Department of Justice investigation into two a16z top executives.
- The trigger was the fact that they hold leadership roles at competing companies.
- This could be a violation of the Clayton Antitrust Act.
Andreessen Horowitz (a16z) has come under antitrust scrutiny from the U.S. Department of Justice because members of its leadership hold senior positions at competing businesses — Databricks and Fivetran. Bloomberg reported this, citing sources familiar with the matter.
According to the outlet, the investigation has been ongoing for about a year. It began amid a review of the deal between Fivetran and dbt labs.
Information about it emerged in October 2025. The merger was completed in June 2026, and the U.S. Department of Justice ultimately approved it after a thorough review.
The reason for the antitrust investigation was the fact that Ben Horowitz, a16z co-founder, sits on Databricks’ board of directors, as also stated on his bio page. His partner, Martin Casado, for his part, is a member of Fivetran’s leadership team.
Both companies received financial backing from a16z. In particular, the firm led Fivetran’s $44 million round in September 2019. Casado also joined the latter’s board of directors at the time.
Why Is the DOJ Opposed to a16z Top Executives Taking Part in Managing Two Different Companies?
Both Fivetran and Databricks operate in the AI space. The former provides infrastructure for collecting and structuring data, while the latter offers storage for it and enables analytics. The companies are closely linked and collaborate.
For example, in 2026, Fivetran named Databricks its strategic partner of the year. However, while their activities used to be adjacent but non-overlapping, the situation changed in 2024.
That year, Databricks launched Lakeflow Connect — its own service for quickly ingesting data from SQL Server, Salesforce, Workday, and other sources.
At the same time, the US Department of Justice interprets the Clayton Antitrust Act more broadly than Section 8 provides for. In a case against Oaktree Capital Management, the agency emphasized that a business structure may violate the act’s provisions if its representatives hold seats on competitors’ boards.
The US Department of Justice also has several court precedents with relevant rulings on record. For example, the agency forced Thoma Bravo representatives to leave the boards of technology companies due to similar overlaps.
As of the time of writing, neither the agency nor a16z has commented on the situation.
Previously, we reported that a16z launched a $2.2 billion fund to develop AI infrastructure.
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