2023-04-16 09:11:02
Brussels (awp/afp) – Microsoft is on the home stretch of a campaign to convince competition authorities in the EU, UK and US to approve its takeover bid for Activision Blizzard , owner of the hit games “Candy Crush” and “Call Of Duty”.
The Xbox owner has a few weeks left to persuade the three regulators that its proposed 69 billion euro merger does not pose a threat to its rivals. Decisions are expected in the spring.
Brussels opened an investigation in November, saying it feared that Microsoft could “lock access to Activision Blizzard’s video games” for consoles and PCs, including the famous “Call of Duty” and that it was tempted to set up ” eviction strategies of competing distributors”.
The European executive is also worried about an impact on the operating system market, believing that consumers could be discouraged from buying PCs that do not run Windows, the flagship of the American giant becoming even more attractive thanks to access to Activision Blizzard games.
Concerns are no less acute in the United Kingdom and the United States.
Sony, maker of PlayStation, the market’s best-selling console, says the deal will give Microsoft the power to limit rivals’ access to the popular franchise.
The American giant retorts that erecting barriers would make no sense for him from a financial point of view.
The most difficult institution to convince could be the British authority (CMA) which estimated in February that the takeover could harm consumers, in preliminary conclusions.
The UK market is smaller than the US or EU market, but a CMA blockage could force Microsoft to back down.
Microsoft will have to comply with the conditions imposed by the CMA, failing which the group would be forced to withdraw all its products from the British market, estimates Anne Witt, specialist in competition law at EDHEC (France).
However, “it is unthinkable that Microsoft will completely withdraw from the United Kingdom. It is not only about video games, but also Windows”, the operating system for PC’s best-selling in the world, has-t- she told AFP.
Possible discrepancies
“The CMA is the first competition authority to have banned a large technology acquisition globally”, recalled this expert, referring to the decision in November 2021 to force Meta, owner of Facebook, to sell the animated graphics startup Giphy .
If the CMA takes a tougher stance than Brussels on Microsoft/Activision Blizzard, it would be the first time since Brexit that the UK regulator has walked away from the EU on such an important matter. But such a discrepancy would give the Redmond group a solid case to challenge the decision in court.
However, last month the CMA scaled back its concerns over the merger, saying it was ultimately not a problem for game consoles, with fears remaining only for cloud game services.
The CMA concluded “that it would not be commercially advantageous for Microsoft to reserve the exclusivity of Call of Duty on (its console) Xbox” and that the American computer giant would “still have the incentive to continue to make the game available on PlayStation”.
The British authority should make its decision by April 26, while the European Commission should decide by May 22. It could also be that one of them is in disagreement with the American authority (FTC) which launched legal proceedings in December to block the takeover.
“It is possible that the United Kingdom and the EU, and then the FTC, judge the operation anticompetitive”, estimates Eleanor Fox, professor at the school of law of the New York University (NYU). “It is also possible that there will be differences on proposed remedies or on allowing Microsoft to make certain commitments” for a green light.
During a recent visit to Brussels, Brad Smith, a Microsoft executive, expressed confidence of an EU approval, after agreements reached to make “Call of Duty” accessible to more gamers, by distributing digital games on Nintendo consoles and competing services.
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