Microsoft Acquires Activision: Largest Technology Deal In 20 Years

The American “big tech company” Microsoft has received the green light to acquire US video game giant Activision Blizzard for $69 billion.

This is the high-tech world’s largest acquisition in more than 20 years, since America On Line (AOL) bought Time Warner in 2001 for more than $180 billion. The green light for the operation, which had been speculated for months, was approved by the British Competition and Markets Authority (CMA), which was satisfied with certain changes made to the deal, most notably the sale of cloud gaming rights to a third company, France’s Ubisoft.

“The new agreement will prevent Microsoft from blocking competition in the cloud gaming sector as the market develops, while maintaining competitive prices and services for cloud gaming customers in Great Britain,” the CMA said in a note. “(The agreement – ed.) will help ensure that game providers’ cloud technologies can use non-Windows operating systems for Activision content, reducing costs and increasing efficiency. This new deal will put the cloud streaming rights (outside the European Economic Area) for all Activision PC and console content created over the next 15 years into the hands of a strong independent competitor (Ubisoft – ed.) with ambitious plans to offer new ways of access to such content.”

The agreement was accepted with reservations by the EU authorities in May last year, while the British authorities were categorically against it, but now, after amending the agreement, the refusal has been reversed.

“We have now cleared the final regulatory hurdle to close this acquisition, which we believe will benefit gamers and the gaming industry around the world,” explained Brad Smith, Microsoft vice president, as reported by Italian news agency ANSA.