The AI startup micro1 has offered $12.5 million for Spirit's records, surpassing Google's previously arranged $10 million agreement.

      The AI training-data firm micro1 has proposed $12.5 million for the internal records of Spirit Aviation, surpassing Google's previously agreed $10 million offer. They also suggested that an ombudsman be appointed by Spirit’s advisers instead of the buyer. Under European law, the promise of deidentification is regarded as an issue of capability rather than mere terminology, but this does not pertain to an American liquidation.

      According to Bloomberg News, an AI training-data company has made a $12.5 million offer for the internal records of a defunct airline, which is $2.5 million more than Google's agreed payment. micro1 submitted the proposal in a court document on Thursday.

      Spirit Aviation Holdings ceased operations in May and is currently in liquidation. The records encompass 500 million Microsoft Teams items, 100 million emails, and approximately 16 million customer chat sessions.

      Last month, TNW reported that under the Google agreement, Spirit must transfer the materials to designated parties chosen by the buyer. Google selected and financed the company responsible for deidentification, and that expense is not deducted from the purchase price.

      micro1’s offer specifically targets this point, proposing that an ombudsman be appointed by Spirit’s own advisers and stating that the data would be stored within the United States.

      The court document also states that disciplinary and investigatory materials, as well as anything related to collective bargaining with the unions representing Spirit employees, are excluded. Those unions have already raised privacy concerns regarding the Google sale.

      Google claims it will not obtain any personal information from the dataset and intends to hire a third party to remove sensitive customer details. A judge is set to review the purchase on September 9.

      Courts seldom reopen an auction once it has concluded, meaning that micro1 faces a procedural challenge rather than an issue with pricing.

      One complicating factor involves the premium. Google’s agreement omitted customer chat sessions, loyalty records, and call recordings from the sale, while micro1's offer includes around 16 million chat sessions.

      In Europe, the situation would not hinge on the term deidentified. The Court of Justice ruled last September that whether pseudonymised data is considered personal data depends on the recipient's realistic ability to identify individuals.

      This is a matter of capability, not labeling. The Google contract mandates the maintenance of referential integrity, ensuring that pseudonymous records remain interconnected across systems.

      The European Data Protection Board has also indicated that a model trained on personal data is not inherently anonymous, and regulators may investigate whether the training data was lawfully acquired.

      Purpose limitation would be significant here as well. Records created for the operation of aircraft and the compensation of 17,000 employees were not intended for model training, and repurposing them in the EU requires a specific legal basis.

      However, none of these considerations apply in this case. Spirit’s estate is being liquidated under American law, which is why this situation has escalated into a bidding war instead of a regulatory issue, and why EU data regulations would have transformed it into one.