Brazil’s regulatory body has become the first to approve Xbox Game Studios (Microsoft) [2,231 articles]” href=” Proposed acquisition of Activision Blizzard [1,098 articles]”href=” Blizzard.
On Wednesday, the country’s Economic Defense Council (CADE) said it has approved the merger without any restrictions.
“Given the immense popularity of Call of Duty, it is reasonable to speculate that if Activision Blizzard games were no longer available on Sony Interactive Entertainment. [2,562 articles]” href = console, playstation [6,298 articles]” href=” Users can decide to migrate to Xbox [5,815 articles]” href=” or even a pc [6,322 articles]Part of CADE’s summary reads, “href=” to continue access to franchise games.
“On the other hand, it’s also fair to assume that if the upcoming Call of Duty games became exclusive to the Microsoft ecosystem, players loyal to the PlayStation brand could simply skip the series, limiting their demand to other games available on their favorite console. can move in.”
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It continues: “Despite this, one cannot rule out the possibility that Microsoft actively adopting an exclusivity strategy on Blizzard games could potentially be profitable, even if a decision in this direction could result in a sale. Might result in the sacrifice of the relevant part, the user and even the popularity of Call of Duty.
“This is because, in theory, such a strategy could contribute to increasing Xbox sales, expanding the Game Pass customer base, and strengthening the network effect on the Microsoft ecosystem, so that revenue from game sales can be increased.” to be compensated for any loss. condition.”
CADE’s decision states that it believes exclusive content has been “very important” to competition in the console market, and is one of the main factors attributed to PlayStation and Nintendo. [3,031 articles]” href=” position as market leaders.
“Exclusive games are a benchmark of competition between Microsoft and SIE, although no company has yet developed or achieved a specific game that has decisively shifted the balance in favor of the console. This is because proprietary Exclusive games are less popular and represent less revenue than third-party AAA games, which have until then been available on Xbox and PlayStation.
It concluded: “As already seen, Nintendo does not currently rely on any of Activision Blizzard’s content to compete in the market. Sony, in turn, has several predictions – for more than 20 years. World leading brand strength, wide experience in the field, largest user base, largest installed base of consoles, strong catalog of exclusive games, partnerships with multiple publishers, brand loyal consumers, etc – which is a potential post-operation The scenario should contribute to maintaining PlayStation’s competitiveness, even in the event of a potential loss of access to Activision Blizzard content.
“Furthermore, it is important to highlight that the central objective of CADE’s activities is the protection of competition as a means of promoting the well-being of Brazilian consumers, and not the protection of the exclusive interests of specific competitors.
“After all, one cannot forget the fact that the holder of the legal property protected by Law No. 12,529/2011 is a collective, and not a competitor/economic agent as an individual entity.
“In this sense, although it is recognized that part of users of PlayStation consoles (from Sony) may decide to migrate to Xbox, if Activision Blizzard games – and in particular Call of Duty – are exclusive to the Microsoft ecosystem, SG/CAD does not believe that such a possibility, in itself, represents a risk to competition in the console market as a whole.”
The Brazilian regulator was one of the first to publicly share its correspondence around the merger, which included unprecedented access to Q&A responses from companies such as Sony, Ubisoft. [787 articles]”href=” Amazon Games [338 articles]” href=” and Google [271 articles]” href=”https://www.videogameschronicle.com/companies/google/”>Google.
The decision comes from Saudi Arabia’s General Authority for Competition, which announced in August that it had “no objection” to the proposed game industry buyout.
The proposed $68.7 billion acquisition is currently being scrutinized by regulators around the world amid antitrust concerns during a time of growing consolidation in the gaming industry.
According to a report published on Wednesday, the US Federal Trade Commission (FTC) may reportedly rule on Microsoft’s proposed acquisition of Activision Blizzard by the end of November.
Meanwhile, the UK’s competition regulator announced on Tuesday that it has set a March 1, 2023 deadline to publish the findings of its investigation into the deal.
In particular, the Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) is concerned about the impact of the deal on PlayStation’s ability to compete, noting that the deal would give Microsoft ownership of the Call of Duty series.
Microsoft officially filed its case with the European Commission last Friday for its proposed acquisition of Activision Blizzard.
The European competition watchdog has set a provisional deadline of 8 November to approve the deal or enter a second, more detailed investigation phase, as the CMA has recently chosen to do.
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