FTC Has Ordered Sony To Unveil Their Third-Party Exclusive Contracts

gameranx.com:

There is always chatter online regarding the Microsoft bid to acquire Activision Blizzard. The Xbox company has made several efforts to ensure that this deal would not cause any issues regarding fair competitiveness in the video game industry. However, it’s still an ongoing battle between Microsoft and Sony. Microsoft is going through a series of regulators to see if they’ll allow the purchase to follow through. Meanwhile, Sony has been very vocal against this idea and pressed the fact that this could hurt competition with Microsoft’s potential to make certain franchises like Call of Duty exclusive. 

In the run-up to these court battles, there was a subpoena sent out by Microsoft to Sony that demanded the FTC gains access to their various third-party exclusivity agreements and licensing deals. Of course, Sony wasn’t keen on the idea and attempted to sway the court to avoid having these documents come up in court. Unfortunately for Sony, since the argument is about exclusivity deals and the fact that it could hurt the competition, it seemed only fair that the court could view Sony’s own agreements with third-party companies. 

As reported by VGC, the court order looks to only seek out the agreements that have been made since 2019. That should help cut down on the number of documents that would end up flooding the court. It should also give plenty of insight into the deals and Sony’s own impact on competition within the industry. Of course, we’ll have to wait and see just how the court views these documents after receiving them. At any rate, Microsoft’s Xbox head, Phil Spencer, has made it abundantly clear that they have no desire to see Call of Duty become exclusive to the Xbox brand.

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