legal battle between Microsoft and Federal Trade Commission United States (FTC) for the purchase of Activision Blizzard this week will be the first chapter. A federal judge has set that the parties will meet each other on Tuesday, January 3, in a preliminary hearing in a case that should decide the fate of the publisher’s acquisition. call of Dutyis valued at nearly $69 billion.

At this time, no further details have been provided about this first court-level meeting between Redmond and the FTC. Recall that the body, headed by Lina Khan, in early December last year, asked the justice to block the deal on the grounds that it would give Xbox an advantage over its main competitors, PlayStation and Nintendo, in access to Activision Blizzard games.

While Microsoft denies this is its intent, the discussion about how anti-competitive the acquisition might be was the main argument for regulators to voice their doubts about it. Company led by Satya Nadella expects to close the deal by the end of June 2023.. However, the FTC lawsuit could complicate his plans. Added to this is the scrutiny that the purchase also faces in the United Kingdom and the European Union.

Over the past year, the Federal Trade Commission has been particularly aggressive on mergers and acquisitions involving large corporations. The most high-profile case occurred with NVIDIA, which abandoned its attempt to buy ARM. Despite this, experts believe that the FTC has a harder time in the case of Microsoft and Activision Blizzard.

The FTC would not have had enough to block the purchase of Activision Blizzard.

Apart from what happened with NVIDIA and ARM, the latest major agreements contested by the Federal Trade Commission or the US Department of Justice have still been approved. AT&T purchase of Time Warnerworth $85.4 billion, which was approved in 2018. Acquisition of Change Healthcare by UnitedHealth Group in exchange for $13,000 million. D merger of Illumina Inc. and its former subsidiary Grail Inc. for $7,100 million.

But how do these deals relate to the deal between Microsoft and Activision Blizzard? In all of them, concessions were made – sale processes, companies that continued to operate in isolation, etc. – to refute accusations of monopolism leveled by the regulators. And the Redmonds have already publicly committed to taking steps to prevent their new business from negatively impacting the video game industry.

In recent weeks, Phil Spencer’s people have announced they intend to launch call of Duty on PlayStation on par with Xbox for 10 years. Although they have already developed a similar plan to bring popular first-person shooters to the Nintendo Switch.

In addition, Microsoft assured that ending said franchise’s offer on the PlayStation would be “disastrous and irrational”. And that his true intention after purchasing Activision Blizzard is, in addition to strengthening the Xbox Game Pass catalog, dive into the world of mobile games. Even with its own store, competing with the Apple App Store and Google Play Store.

“Microsoft does not currently have a significant presence in the mobile gaming space and the deal will bring much needed experience in mobile game development, marketing and advertising. Activision Blizzard will be able to share its knowledge of mobile game development and publishing with Xbox game studios. “.

Microsoft on the future of Activision Blizzard and mobile games.

Judgment path that can be very long

It is understood that the pre-trial hearing that Microsoft and the FTC will hold this week It won’t change much in the future. Any analysis aside, everything suggests today that if litigation bidding intensifies and expands over time, it’s unlikely that Redmond will close its Activision Blizzard purchase before the end of the first half of 2023.

Meanwhile in Europe, regulators have already set a deadline to determine whether to approve the agreement or not. This will happen on March 23, when the investigation that is ongoing regarding the purchase will be completed.

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Source: Hiper Textual

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