Microsoft / Activision Deal Approval Watch |OT| (MS/ABK close)

Do you believe the deal will be approved?

  • Yes, will be approved without changes.

    Votes: 221 24.9%

  • Yes, will be approved but with structural changes to ABK.

    Votes: 102 11.5%

  • Yes, will be approved but only with behavioral concessions.

    Votes: 262 29.6%

  • No, will not be approved.

    Votes: 301 34.0%
  • Total voters
    886
  • Poll closed .
Status
Not open for further replies.
IntentionalPun said:
Now we can enjoy the whole thing dying because of the CMA.

Anyone who is a fan of this acquisition needs to really quell their excitement.
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Oof. I'm guessing you missed the news about CMA wanting to cut an agreement with MS?

Season 6 Surprise GIF by Friends
 
zapper said:
In your opinion, when ms will announce the success of the deal, how much will Sony shares drop? how financially endangered is sony? lately they had slowed down for this deal, if the shares fall they will have to react in some way..?
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They've been preparing for this day and have something up their sleeve that'll double their share price. Yeah, it's Knack III bitch.
 
zapper said:
In your opinion, when ms will announce the success of the deal, how much will Sony shares drop? how financially endangered is sony? lately they had slowed down for this deal, if the shares fall they will have to react in some way..?
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I think the first thing they will do is show the first party games that their studios are working on.
A price drop for the console won't be of the table.
From there on Sony will most likely look for partnerships to guarantee exclusive content for their platform.
I also expect to see them making a stronger push to the cloud and streaming.
 
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thicc_girls_are_teh_best said:
One thing I will say, is that Xbox should see a noticeable bump in sales and Game Pass subs for the rest of the year. They only had to spend $70 billion for a single publisher to do it, but they did it.

(Pyrrhic) congrats.
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Pyrrhic victory indeed. I wonder if this won't go down as one of the worst deals in history for Microsoft. I almost hope the CMA does allow it because I think Microsoft are going to regret buying this big time. We'll see.
 
tmlDan said:
This may not be what people want to hear but as soon as Kotick leaves/if he does (despite being a shitty human) the company could potentially plummet into a shittier space than it is
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You know I can't believe MS would let Kotick go - love him or hate him he has a proven track record and has given people content they were prepared to pay for. MS needs that kind of help and he'd be dangerous to let go where he can join a competitor or at least consult for one.

I can see him staying and basically taking over the show.
 
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Begleiter said:
I'm sure Jim Ryan pulled people into rooms earlier this year to discuss who they buy and how else they mitigate this and those plans will start going into effect. He's a moron but he won't be *that* asleep at the wheel.

And Microsoft will see that there's no one they won't be allowed to buy, so they'll have the next purchase lined up from their list.

September for Sony, October for Microsoft.
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I wouldn't put it past him to think Concord and Fairgames will make up for COD's lost revenue
 
ToadMan said:
You know I can't believe MS would let Kotick go - love him or hate him he has a proven track record and has given people content they were prepared to pay for. MS needs that kind of help and he'd be dangerous to let go where he can join a competitor or at least consult for one. I can see him staying and basically taking over the show.
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I wouldn't be surprised either, for everyone cheering how this deal was Microsoft helping us out by getting rid of Kotick it always seemed more likely he'd end up in charge of Xbox IMO, they saved his ass
 
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ToadMan said:
You know I can't believe MS would let Kotick go - love him or hate him he has a proven track record and has given people content they were prepared to pay for. MS needs that kind of help and he'd be dangerous to let go where he can join a competitor or at least consult for one. I can see him staying and basically taking over the show.
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No chance. Guarantee you Kottick runs Xbox sometime next gen.
 
chrizzz09 said:
This is true. I think people really just do not comprehend how massive a 2 trillion dollar corporation is. 2 trillion dollars is so much money, if you are a millionaire and make 1 million dollars every year, it would take you 2 MILLION YEARS to reach 2 trillion dollars. Let that sink in.

I mean, people expected this to happen, since corruption is strong in our world, but the blatant argument that Xbox is the "little guy in third place" and needs this to compete is fucking absurd when they use papa Nadella's money to buy up the industry.

It seems people on a certain side clearly seem to prefer a short-term jerk, but fail to realize they get ass fucked long-term.
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Microsoft has the second most amount of "fuck you" money in tech. They can force rich countries to do what they want.

People suggested Microsoft should just "leave the UK". They could have said they were doing that and guess what? The UK government would hold emergency meetings and bend over backwards to do anything to make Microsoft happy.

If Microsoft really did leave the UK it would literally cripple the UK government and health service. As fucked up as we are right now I can't begin to imagine the damage of Microsoft leaving. So yeah the government would do everything they could to satisfy Microsoft. All this CMA shit was just posturing.

That's the power of $2.5 trillion.
 
aliadiere25 said:
F0xXh8mWAAUWang


See.... the Judge claims it's bad for Sony, yet it's apparently good for future gamers (can't be good for future games if you're singling gamers out). Even she knows that lying Phil is going to make it exclusive to just Game Pass.
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the Brazilan papers came to the same conclusion and without the need of this circus.
 
ToadMan said:
You know I can't believe MS would let Kotick go - love him or hate him he has a proven track record and has given people content they were prepared to pay for. MS needs that kind of help and he'd be dangerous to let go where he can join a competitor or at least consult for one. I can see him staying and basically taking over the show.
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My belief is that they are now far too embroiled in woke culture as an organisation to ever let that happen, even if it would be obvious and necessary.

Long live Phil.
 
What I don't understand is the people saying 'oh no now MS is gonna raise the price of Gamepass' - ok, well, they have not (to date) released a gamepass only game, so if it ever stops being worth it, people can and will unsubscribe, and go back to buying the games outright.

Am I missing something obvious? Or are folks just coming up with reasons this is 'bad'?
 
IntentionalPun said:
Wonder if MS knew ahead of time if the FTC injunction failed that CMA was ready to compromise.

Would explain their confidence.
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probably, given redactions were already made it seems likely the judge alerted them last week meaning she made this decision in roughly a week even with there being a holiday last week, it's insane how quick she did this since this is only the 7th business day after closing arguments? someone else said these decisions usually take months and she maybe took a week for the biggest one ever
 
DrFigs said:
Well I mean the advantage to consumers of MS buying Activision is not clear to me either. All platforms were already getting these games. And MS could already pay to put Activision games on Gamepass if they wanted to. So I don't really understand the strategy except that they want to deprive competitors of these products. It's a weird situation for Sony because they kind of are in danger of losing a ton of revenue if MS makes COD exclusive and Japanese games (which are way more profitable on the switch) are not going to cut it.
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I'm not sure you fully grasp the concept of an investment. You're making this way more complicated than it really is.
 
Banjo64 said:
Curious to see how this pans out.

I'm assuming the original deadline is still in place.

What's a reasonable compromise if divestiture is off the table? A longer contract offer with a fairer financial model?

Ultimately the CMA were in a position where they didn't have to go back to the negotiating table (aside from good faith if Microsoft requested it), so it'll be interesting to hear the proposal.
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I'd love to see the CMA actually be constructive here and create some actual regulation around licensing agreements that can be applied more broadly to the overall gaming landscape.
 
sankt-Antonio said:
Let's not kid ourselves. MS is a US company, Tecent would never be allowed to buy Acti-Blizz. Neither would have Sony.

The US , at the end of the day, is working to push for US dominance in every field.
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Yes, there's clearly a political angle to this. Even if the judge is 100% impartial - the fact of the matter is that this is something that congress is concerning themselves with and bringing up publicly. And MS is a huge employer in the U.S. and has a powerful lobbying arm. That's not to say that the judge wouldn't have always come to this conclusion or that the FTC had a great case, but that there is clearly political pressures too.
 
X-Wing said:
I think the first thing they will do is show the first party games that their studios are working on.
A price drop for the console won't be of the table.
From there on Sony will most likely look for partnerships to guarantee exclusive content for their platform.
I also expect to see them making a stronger push to the cloud and streaming.
Click to expand...
Dude relax, this won't change a thing for Sony. They will continue doing just fine. What can't happen is this obsession that Jimbo has with GaaS.
 
RavenSan said:
What I don't understand is the people saying 'oh no now MS is gonna raise the price of Gamepass' - ok, well, they have not (to date) released a gamepass only game, so if it ever stops being worth it, people can and will unsubscribe, and go back to buying the games outright.

Am I missing something obvious? Or are folks just coming up with reasons this is 'bad'?
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the reason is your confirmation bias
 
DForce said:
FTC decision is not a surprise but the CMA response is.

If this deal goes through then you're going to see mass consolidation. It's going to be bad for the industry.
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No doubt.
With the biggest acquisition allowed, acquiring all the rest is a non-issue from the regulators.

 
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nightmare-slain said:
People suggested Microsoft should just "leave the UK". They could have said they were doing that and guess what? The UK government would hold emergency meetings and bend over backwards to do anything to make Microsoft happy.

If Microsoft really did leave the UK it would literally cripple the UK government and health service. As fucked up as we are right now I can't begin to imagine the damage of Microsoft leaving. So yeah the government would do everything they could to satisfy Microsoft. All this CMA shit was just posturing.
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Still on this, eh?
New Girl Facepalm GIF by HULU
 
Ogbert said:
The UK process isn't anything like as adversarial as the US. It obviously can be, at the very final stage, but the iterative stages before that give the parties more than enough time to reach a resolution.
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I trust. I still don't understand why do they run away from their job which would be to defend their choice in court.
 
PaintTinJr said:
It could actually just be a way of forcing them to obey the law, by negotiating all the way to the closure date, and then still blocking it, because Microsoft won't back down.

Being unable to get a schedule that would allow them to get suitable representation will also have been a factor, because it is a consenting delay from Microsoft, as the pause in legal action will cause that time table to move backwards to the CMA's advantage.

It might also be that their behind the scenes discussions with OFCOM means fighting this might be worthless if OFCOM are intending to legislate heavily for Cloud and Cloud gaming competition, so service costs might be a level playing field for all - including Microsoft as the old BT- just like access to the national telecoms network (OpenReach formerly BT) is the same to all least-cost-routing providers, today.

The pause in legislating might also mean the 10% fine issue would now be active, and no longer a new law, not applying to an old offense.
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It certainly won't be the former, as that would be a regulatory body knowingly acting in bad faith. And it simply can't be a scheduling or resource issue. There are a sufficient number of lawyers in the Square Mile to work on one of the largest antitrust cases in history.

Occam's Razor - it's invariably the least dramatic reason at work. The market definition was too broad and I think the CMA have realised that their initial position was overreach. That their statement cites 'public interest' suggests a body that is looking to negotiate a resolution.

I mean, for MS to fuck it up from here would be truly spectacular.
 
DrFigs said:
I wouldn't put it past him to think Concord and Fairgames will make up for COD's lost revenue
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It's difficult to imagine they're unaware of the response to the last batch of announcements, I can't see them being relied on. Even Ryan has to have enough braincells firing to know they need more.
 
Aren't people kinda overlooking that what was denied here was merely a preliminary injunction, the FTC can I believe continue to oppose the deal via administrative litigation, especially when the CMA ruling still stands.
 
RavenSan said:
What I don't understand is the people saying 'oh no now MS is gonna raise the price of Gamepass' - ok, well, they have not (to date) released a gamepass only game, so if it ever stops being worth it, people can and will unsubscribe, and go back to buying the games outright.

Am I missing something obvious? Or are folks just coming up with reasons this is 'bad'?
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It isn't just the price increase in a monthly subscription, it's also bad due to certain companies monopolizing other companies and eventually making games exclusive to their platform which weren't exclusive before. You either have to spend way more money to play a certain franchise that you love.... or you don't.

Regardless, it's a number of things. This isn't a good thing.
 
Varteras said:
As much as we hate him as gamers, shareholders and other executives love him. The dude makes money. If he isn't immediately out, he'll be in charge of Xbox in 5 years or so.
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Tom Warren confirmed early on that Bobby is out once the acquisition goes through. Obviously not immediately but when they do their leadership restructuring he won't be a part of it.
 
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