Microsoft intends to invest in designing video games and building a virtual world of “Metaverse”
Microsoft, the giant information technology company, recorded significant sales and profits in all areas of its business at the end of last year, and intends to use these profits to invest in video games and in building the virtual world of Metaverse.
“We feel we are in a good position to engage in the next wave of the internet,” Satya Nadella, the company’s president, said Thursday during the group’s quarterly earnings conference.
Last week, he announced his plan to acquire Activision Blizzard (whose main products include Call of Duty and Candy Crush), as well as expand into the virtual world of Metaverse, the future of the digital world.
This $69 billion deal is the most significant merger and acquisition in the technology world.
Between October and December, Microsoft generated $51.7 billion in revenue and posted a net profit of $18.8 billion, results that beat average analyst expectations.
On the other hand, the Xbox, which is the second most used video game system in the world, recorded a limited increase in its revenues of 10 percent, and it came following Sony’s PlayStation, which acquired 64.5 percent of the market share in the world in 2021, according to the report. What Statista said.
Nadella confirmed that the bets that the company has placed on content, gaming platforms and the cloud in recent years have paid off, adding that we have achieved record levels in the number of followers during the past quarter.
He noted that 18 million people have used Forza Horizon 5, and more than 20 million people have played Hello Infinite.
His group hopes to integrate Activision games into the monthly subscription service for the Xbox Game Pass. The operation would make Microsoft the third largest conglomerate in the video game sector in terms of sales volume, following China’s Tencent and Japan’s Sony.
At the end of October, Microsoft announced the acquisition of Two Hat, a content supervision company that was involved in removing problematic content on Xbox.
Video games are considered the precursor to the world of metaverse. The game is just one element of platforms like Roblox or Minecraft that teens specifically use to find themselves.
Nadella said game users are starting to invest in their avatars and build virtual worlds in Minecraft.
Nadella also relies on the group’s traditional services to generate revenue and create connections with new virtual worlds.
During the past quarter, sales of the Office suite and data storage and processing services improved 14 percent at the company level, and 15 percent at the individual level. And her social network, LinkedIn, has grown by 37%.
Nadella said that meetings will be held on the Times Through Mesh platform, an augmented or virtual reality collaboration platform, noting that these meetings will start on screens, computers or smartphones and become more attractive with the use of appropriate equipment.
But some analysts express skepticism regarding Microsoft’s ability to move forward so quickly, firstly because the acquisition of Activision Blizzard will take time, and secondly because recovery from the pandemic might translate into a decrease in demand and therefore revenue.
The expert at Third Bridge, Scott Kessler, said we saw the decline of many companies following they were among the stars of the early stage of the pandemic, noting that the growth of digital technology in light of health measures is not clear that it will remain sustainable.
