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Looking to the future: Microsoft buys Activision Blizzard, King and others

Ramiro Guzman
5 min de lectura
Looking to the future: Microsoft buys Activision Blizzard, King and others
Microsoft surprises the market by buying the rights to large technology franchises

The popular multinational technology company has taken a key step towards the future. Recently, the purchase of other major franchises such as Activision Blizzard and King was announced.

In this way, it becomes the brand's first huge pronouncement for 2022. An agreement between arts that, according to first reports, will close around 70 billion dollars.

Purchase details: What is known so far?

January 18, 2022 will be marked as the day Microsoft revolutionized the digital marketplace. In the first instance, The Wall Street Journal advanced what would be one of the most striking commercial operations in memory.

Since the union of Facebook and WhatsApp, such a prominent moment has not been evident. After the press release published by said news outlet, Microsoft confirmed what had been speculating. A negotiation that finally was around 68 to 70 billion dollars.

The official board says that the transaction was carried out with a clear objective. Make Microsoft a competitive company not only at a technological and development level, but also in the world of video games.

Remembering, the company is responsible for the distribution of the Xbox brand and its different consoles. Now, with this new opportunity, the field will expand to mobile devices and even to the technological cloud. Therefore, it is a drastic change that will revolutionize your presence.

The figures and data that are handled by digital media

Although it is a fact that the purchase will proceed, it will first be subject to a series of legal fringes.

As they are resolved, Microsoft hopes to complete the acquisition of the rights and shares in fiscal year 2023. Slow, but at a sure pace that will allow for a good merger.

Looking to the future: Microsoft buys Activision Blizzard, King and others
Activision Blizzard is one of the acquired studios that opens the door to great titles in games

Likewise, he hinted at the transparency with which the move will be carried out. The released statement mentions that for each share they will pay an estimated price of $95 in total. In the end, the full digit sum will be around $70 million ($68.5 billion specifically).

The purchase of Activision Blizzard supposes the obtaining of other great attached franchises such as King. Similarly, you can not forget Infinity Ward, Treyarch, Sledgehammer Games, among others. Based on this, there are around 10,000 employees under the wings of these studies.

A purchase that signifies a turning point

After various rumors, both Xbox and Microsoft confirmed the scenario. A purchase that symbolizes a turning point when compared to previous events related to this field.

  1. When Minecraft became part of the technological giant, the final amount did not exceed 2,500 million dollars. Until that date, it was the largest outlay for the company as a whole.

  2. The good revenues that Minecraft brought with it served to catapult another event of magnificent properties. For 7,500 million dollars, the transactional movement of Bethesda to Microsoft as such was completed.

Both accounting movements are not compared with the current moment. An investment that, in the long term, will give Microsoft the possibility of being the third company in the industry with the highest amounts of income. It will only be behind the legendary Tencent and Sony.

The announcement alone has fueled Activision Blizzard's stock surge by 30%. All this without counting the earnings from more than 400 million active users in the different games developed by the franchise.

Looking to the future: Microsoft buys Activision Blizzard, King and others
Call of Duty will be one of the main attractions now linked to Microsoft

Some prominent and popular titles like Call of Duty and World of Warcraft will move into Microsoft's repertoire. Also unifying Candy Crush, StarCraft, Overwatch, Diablo and the yesteryear, but much loved, Crash Bandicoot.

The controversy around Activision Blizzard that needs to be cleared up

The purchase comes at a morally difficult time for Activision Blizzard, but it hasn't gone too far. Franchise CEO Bobby Kotick will remain at the forefront of decisions while the deal is completed.

Kotick has been accused of harassment within the work environment, as well as promoting a bad work environment. These anonymous revelations paved the way for the opening of an investigation by the United States Government.

However, it has not been possible to effectively conclude how guilty Kotick is and how truthful the information from the victims and witnesses is. The truth is that he will retain his position until 2023, the year in which he will be definitively replaced by Phil Spencer.

Spencer has been in charge of spreading a conciliation message through the official Xbox account. In it, he assures that the company's commitment will be total with the functions of Activision Blizzard. At the same time, they hope to infect the more than 10,000 employees with a proactive spirit.

Will there be possible consequences or legal obstacles?

Activision Blizzard is one of the largest video game technology franchises in the United States. Although it is not the only one, the level of its collections far exceeds others that are currently active.

The main obstacles or legal consequences go through the laws stipulated against monopoly by the US Congress. It is the same panorama that Facebook (now Meta) and its president Mark Zuckerberg are going through after the purchase of WhatsApp and Instagram.

They will also have to wait for the relevant endorsement from the Activision Blizzard shareholders' meeting. Although the business is not potentially in immediate danger, we will have to wait for the fiscal year to be completed to close any fringe.

In other words, the negotiation will oscillate between July 2022 and June 2023. Enough time for the legal horizon to become sufficiently clear until there is no monopoly risk. Until then, Microsoft will keep abreast of any relevant fluctuations.

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