I've seen one strategy floating around that suggests that if MS can convince the EU, which may be more receptive to remedies, it would pressure the others to allow the deal as well. It seems unlikely imo, but I dunno.
Microsoft's acquisition of Activison Blizzard
- Thread starter Satoru
- Start date
Sell Call of Duty or we’ll block $69bn Activision takeover, Microsoft told
Britain’s competition watchdog has threatened to block Microsoft’s $69bn (£57bn) merger with Activision Blizzard or force the PC-maker to sell the best performing video game involved in the deal.
Highly unlikely. The FTC would not want to seem like it’s just going along with other regulatory bodies are doing and would continue to fight this deal to the last.
Selling it wouldn't mean giving it to PlayStation, it would mean making it an independent 3rd party dev.Sell the Call of Duty IP to Sony and MS can have the rest - i agree, CMA!
MS must be pulling their hair out right now
Great news, and L M F A O
Regardless of what the end result ends up being, today has been pretty funny.
I see. I also remember reading somewhere that it is very rare for the CMA to change their minds between provisional and final statements.
So what happens to this image?
MS won’t spend twice the real value of Activision just to get one third of it.
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One point that I haven't seen anyone raise is server hosting. Activision and Blizzard (and king) all use Amazon Worldwide Services (AWS) and NOT Microsoft's Azure. Once those games migrate to Azure, Microsoft owns what happens to them by default. New contracts need to be signed etc etc
They could make it more expensive, more costly or slower to run games on a competing platform to Xbox. Afterall, servers are not part of the Xbox division and do not fall under the banner of "keeping all games equal on other platforms"
They could make it more expensive, more costly or slower to run games on a competing platform to Xbox. Afterall, servers are not part of the Xbox division and do not fall under the banner of "keeping all games equal on other platforms"
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The FTC and CMA are aware of that, I'm sure.
CMA appears to say either divest/split off Activision and COD or no deal.
UK regulator suggests removing Call of Duty from Microsoft’s Activision Blizzard acquisition | VGC
In its provisional conclusion, the CMA says Xbox’s Activision deal ‘could harm’ players…www.videogameschronicle.com
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I don't doubt it. I was mainly talking about the armchair analysts and Microsoft fans. They fail to mention about the servers and how Microsoft will control the delivery of those games. Maybe they don't know, don't care or their NPC update hasn't dropped yet.
Jp Morgan bought the railroads to move his product and to stop his competitor from moving theirs. Microsoft could do the same.
EDIT: Fwiw King also uses AWS.
So we're looking at (rough math) 200 million users for AB and 250 million users for K, swapping over to Azure servers. I wonder if that's the reason Microsoft was offline the other week? Server update?
Based on the majority of the opposition to this being based around COD, does this situation imply that regulators would let them buy other publishers as long as they aren't taking away any IP as major as COD?
Phil caught in yet another lie. If this deal was about mobile/cloud, they would have just bought Blizz/King. People will tell you CoD isn't important, but it definitely is. sony getting marketing with cod in 2015 was a big push on making playstation the standard console.
they chose the worst possible publisher to buy, but I must say ABK is a very tasteless company, so they kinda go hand in hand with MS.
they chose the worst possible publisher to buy, but I must say ABK is a very tasteless company, so they kinda go hand in hand with MS.