Microsoft has one major hurdle left in its Activision Blizzard deal
With U.S. Judge Jacqueline Scott Corley siding with Microsoft and choosing not to stop the tech giant’s $68.7 billion acquisition of Activision Blizzard from going through, Microsoft’s road to completing the biggest merger in video game history just got a lot clearer.
The U.S. Federal Trade Commission has yet to conduct its own administrative case arguing against the deal; the case it brought before Judge Corley was simply seeking a temporary injunction against the deal closing while the regulator completed its own process. But the FTC’s case will be conducted in an administrative court that has no power to block the deal. Without the backing of a federal court, it seems likely the FTC will abandon its case, effectively greenlighting the acquisition in the United States.
The European Union has already given its blessing to the acquisition. On May 15, the European Commission announced that it was satisfied with the agreements Microsoft had signed to keep Activision Blizzard games available on rival consoles and cloud gaming services.
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But one of the three most powerful antitrust regulators remains opposed to the deal. The U.K.’s Competition and Markets Authority said in April that it would prevent the deal from going ahead, citing concerns over its effect on competition in the small but growing cloud gaming market.
Microsoft and Activision Blizzard have announced they will appeal the CMA’s decision, but there’s a problem: Their deal has a deadline, and it’s coming up really soon.
According to the terms of the deal, Microsoft needs to close its acquisition of Activision Blizzard by July 18. If it misses that deadline, it will need to pay Activision an eye-watering $3 billion termination fee.
That date is before
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