UK blocks Microsoft from buying Activision Blizzard

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Supervisory authority CMA said Wednesday that this was due to concerns that the deal, worth nearly $69 billion, could disrupt competition in the growing cloud gaming market. Microsoft plans to appeal the decision.

In the US, the FTC regulator is already filing a lawsuit against the largest takeover in the industry, announced in early 2022. A decision by EU antitrust authorities is still pending. Activision Blizzard makes popular and very lucrative games like “Call of Duty”, “Overwatch” and “World of Warcraft”.

Microsoft has a strong position in the online video game business. CMA analysis showed that it could be commercially advantageous for Xbox Group to keep Activision games like “Call of Duty” exclusively for a cloud service.

British competition officials had largely withdrawn their initial concerns about the console market after criticism from Microsoft. Therefore, the ban decision came as a surprise to some market watchers.

The Windows group had tried to allay concerns with concessions. Microsoft has made deals with cloud game providers like Nvidia to provide access to Activision Blizzard games for ten years.

However, the CMA found that the deals were insufficient, in part due to the exclusion of some cloud business models and non-Windows operating systems.

Microsoft executive Brad Smith said UK regulators were rejecting a pragmatic solution to their concerns and risk hurting investment and innovation in their country.

Microsoft and Activision Blizzard initially wanted to complete the acquisition by mid-July. If the deal fails due to resistance from the authorities, the gaming group is eligible to receive three billion dollars from Microsoft.

Last year, British competition authorities had already succeeded in selling the clip platform Giphy, which Facebook group Meta took over in 2020.

(SDA)

Source :Blick