The purchase of Activision Blizzard by Microsoft it is turning into something that looks more and more like a soap opera. While Japan, the European Union and China have already given their approval to the operation, the Redmond giant has encountered two major obstacles in two fields that were supposed to be kinder to its interests, the United States and the United Kingdom, whose antitrust bodies , the FTC and the CMA respectively, are not about to give up easily.
Everything seemed to indicate that the CMA (Competition and Markets Authority) was going to give the go-ahead to the operation, but in the end the British body decided to block it, alluding to Microsoft’s strong dominance in the cloud and on the PC through Windows. How could it be otherwise, the Redmond giant has processed an appeal with the aim that the CMA rectifies and ends up giving its approval, but seeing that it is the body that once buried NVIDIA’s aspirations to acquire ARM, the logical thing is to think that Microsoft is facing a tough nut to crack.
The last blow that Microsoft has received in its intentions to take over Activision Blizzard comes from the FTC (Federal Trade Commission), which has filed a court order and a restraining order to block the purchase process. We recall that the US body already filed a lawsuit for the same purpose at the beginning of the year, so the orders basically go in the direction that it has maintained at general levels, which has not been incompatible with petitions to Sony regarding the agreements that reach with developers and publishers.
It appears that the orders are not really a twist in the FTC’s position, but stem from the fact that the agency had not formally completed the blocking process, that is, by complying with its own paperwork. The FTC’s latest move is considered an injunction, but if finally approved by a federal judge, the acquisition process would stop dead until a trial is held to determine the legality of the operation.
Apart from continuing with the bureaucratic and legal processes that are presented to them, Microsoft and Activision Blizzard are willing to go ahead with the merger process as a measure of pressure, since, if it is consumed definitively, then it will be much more difficult for them to undo. the regulators, who may only have to accept reality.
In short, the US FTC maintains its position of opposition to the purchase of Activision Blizzard by Microsoft and, if the standard procedure is followed and the current positions are maintained, everything seems to indicate that the procedures that began months ago will lead to a judicial process. .
