June 13 (Portaltic/EP) –
The Federal Trade Commission (FTC, for its acronym in English) of the United States is preparing an order to block the purchase agreement of Microsoft and Activision Blizzard before the Administrative Court of the country.
The acquisition of the video game developer was announced in January of last year but, after Sony refused suggesting that this would produce a monopoly, various international organizations have studied the case to determine what could happen if this purchase finally occurs.
In December 2022, the FTC – National Consumer Protection Agency of the United States-, filed a lawsuit to block the purchase from the developer of titles such as Call of Duty for around 60,300 million euros.
This body then argued that this purchase “would allow Microsoft to suppress competitors of its Xbox game consoles and its business of subscription content and games in the cloud, that grows fast.”
The director of the FTC’s Competition Office, Holly Vedova, said also that Microsoft had already demonstrated “that can withhold content from its gaming rivals” and suggested that it would continue to do so if it bought the developer.
“We seek to prevent Microsoft from gaining control from a leading independent game studio and use it to harm competition in multiple fast-growing and dynamic gaming markets,” Vedova insisted.
Now the FTC is asking US courts to block the Xbox maker from acquiring Activision Blizzard with a temporary restraining order (TRO), a document it has seen shows. The Verge.
Therefore, this national agency is intended to legally prevent Microsoft from Complete the acquisition by July 18, 2023. After its corresponding study, in which the legality of the proposed acquisition will be evaluated, an evidentiary hearing will be held, scheduled for August 2.
Despite this situation, the president of Microsoft, Brad Smith, has been optimistic through social networks, where he has assured that the step that the FTC has taken benefits “everyone”. “We always prefer constructive and friendly paths with governments, but we are confident in our case and we are eager to present it,” he clarified in Twitter.
From Activision Blizzard they believe that the intention of the FTC to transfer the case to a federal court “accelerates the legal process”, as stated in a statement sent to the company’s employees and signed by its CEO, Bobby Kotick.
It should be remembered that the United Kingdom has also positioned itself against this comparison. Specifically, it was the Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) that tipped the balance in favor of Sony, assuring that Microsoft had a dominant position within streaming services. For this reason, the company would be planning to withdraw Activision Blizzard from this country, according to Bloomberg.
The European Commission, on the other hand, has approved the acquisition of the developer by the technology giant, because Microsoft “would have no incentive to refuse to distribute Activision games to Sony”.
The Japan Fair Trade Commission (JFTC) has also done so, which at the end of March approved the acquisition of Acitivision Blizzard because it saw no indication that competition in the video game sector could be affected by this transaction.
