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The Federal Trade Commission will approve Google's $3.1 billion DoubleClick acquisition as early as next week, a lawyer involved in the merger told Tech Confidential. Microsoft had led the charge against the merger, claiming it would give Google control over 80 percent of online advertising. And, even though Google's merger will soon go through, it's hard not to credit Microsoft for slowing Google down.

Google announced the acquisition on April 13. But as recently as October, Google CEO Eric Schmidt credited Microsoft's Washington machinations with slowing the merger to an eight-month process.

Obstacles still remain for the the merger, which will continue to face anti-trust review in Europe and separate, privacy-related complaint filed with the FTC by he Electronic Privacy Information Center and other groups.