Xbox’s Phil Spencer started talks with Bobby Kotick the day after attacking Activision
A day after Phil Spencer spoke of being ‘disturbed and deeply troubled by the horrific events’ at Activision he was on the phone to buy the company.
When the news broke about working conditions at Activision Blizzard the outcry was immediate from both gamers and members of the industry, with the heads of Sony, Microsoft, and Nintendo all decrying the allegations of toxic workplace conditions and widespread discrimination.
On November 18, Xbox boss Phil Spencer said he was ‘disturbed and deeply troubled by the horrific events and actions’ at Activision Blizzard and that ‘this type of behaviour has no place in our industry’.
He also stated that he would be ‘evaluating all aspects of our relationship with Activision Blizzard and making ongoing proactive adjustments’, which at the time was assumed to mean some kind of sanction against the company – such as deemphasising its games on the Xbox Store. What it actually meant was that he would immediately go into talks to buy the company.
According to an official legal filing made by Activision Blizzard, the very next day Spencer was on the phone to CEO Bobby Kotick – who was central to many of the allegations – to discuss the acquisition of Activision Blizzard, which Microsoft eventually purchased for £50 billion.
This was also only three days after a Wall Street Journal report suggested that CEO Bobby Kotick knew about many of the allegations for years and purposefully didn’t tell the board of directors.
That seems to confirm existing assumptions that Microsoft used the controversy, which resulted in a significant drop in the value of Activision Blizzard shares, to buy the company for a lot cheaper than it otherwise would have been.
‘In the course of a conversation on a different
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