The ₹2,000 Crore Question: Can India’s New M&A Threshold Stop Killer Acquisitions?
- IJLLR Journal
- Dec 10, 2025
- 1 min read
Updated: Dec 11, 2025
Syanne Clarey Dsouza, Thakur Ramnarayan College of Law
ABSTRACT
India’s booming startup economy has created vast opportunities in sectors such as fintech, digital platforms and biotechnology. At the same time, it has increased the risk of “killer acquisitions", where dominant firms buy smaller, innovative startups primarily with the motive to remove potential future competition. In order to address gaps in its merger control regime, India introduces a new provision called as the "Deal Value Threshold (DVT)" of ₹2,000 crore through the Competition (Amendment) Act, 2023, effective from September 2024. This new reform shifts focus from traditional asset and turnover thresholds to the deal value thresholds, ensuring that high- valuation, asset-light deals built on data, intellectual property or user networks cannot bypass scrutiny.
This article explores how the DVT aims to strengthen competition law, its role in curbing harmful acquisitions and its alignment with international practices. It also examines the challenges that remain, such as the high threshold, ambiguity in defining “substantial business operations", risks of deal structuring and the institutional capacity of the Competition Commission of India (CCI). Ultimately, the paper evaluates whether this threshold can serve as an effective safeguard for India’s innovation-driven economy or whether further refinements will be necessary.
Keywords: Deal Value Threshold (DVT), Competition Law, Killer Acquisitions, Competition Commission of India (CCI), Mergers and Acquisitions, Digital Economy, Startup Regulation.
