The Office of Fair Trading has cleared Inchcape’s acquisition of European Motor Holdings after accepting undertakings for the deal.

The OFT studied the £262.9 million takeover to decide if the deal was anti-competitive.

It announced in March that it was considering whether to accept undertakings from Inchcape to address competition concerns arising from the merger.

The Government body focussed on whether the deal was a ‘substantial lessening of competition within any market or markets in the United Kingdom for goods or services that warrants reference to the Competition Commission for investigation and report’.