Microsoft’s $100b purchase of Activision looks like crazy money
This article was first published at thebit.nz
OPINION: This week, it was revealed that Microsoft plans to spend just over NZ$100 billion on buying Activision Blizzard – a company that’s been more newsworthy for its alleged unsavoury work culture than its entertainment output in recent months.
While the New Zealand dollar figure sounds more impressive than the US$68.7 billion it’s more widely reported as, make no mistake: this is an enormous amount of money to pay, even within the context of tech. In fact, it’s the highest price ever paid by a US company for a tech acquisition, narrowly beating Dell’s purchase of EMC in 2016.
Here are some stats to put that into perspective:
– It’s 3.4 times the amount Facebook paid for Instagram and WhatsApp combined.
– It’s nearly 17 times the amount Disney paid for Lucasfilm for the rights to Star Wars and Indiana Jones.
– It’s about NZ$13.6 billion more than the current net worth of Nintendo.
But even by Microsoft’s Xbox purchase standards, it’s pretty remarkable. The company paid NZ$11 billion for Bethesda (Fallout, The Elder Scrolls, Doom) and NZ$3.6 billion for Mojang (Minecraft). NZ$100 billion is simply a staggering amount of money for a company that recently has seemingly done little more than pump out Call of Duty games to pack the Christmas charts.
* ‘Most hated man in video games’: The scandalous reign of Call of Duty billionaire * Why Microsoft is splashing $103 billion on video games * Microsoft buys Call of Duty maker Activision Blizzard for about $103 billion * Microsoft's augmented-reality headset deal with US Army has 'potential for harm'
Yes, technically that’s harsh for a company that owns the rights to Spyro, Crash Bandicoot, World of Warcraft, Guitar Hero and Candy
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