By PENG Xin
Microsoft announced Friday that it has completed the acquisition of Activision Blizzard, a US game production and distribution company, for US$69 billion (500 billion yuan), the largest merger in the history of the gaming industry.
Activision Blizzard’s stock stands at US$94.42 per share, showing minimal deviation from Microsoft’s initial offer of US$95 per share announced in January 2022, with the deal’s scale largely unchanged.
This acquisition is also the largest in Microsoft’s history, surpassing the acquisition of LinkedIn in 2016. Microsoft now owns 30 game studios, making it the world’s third-largest gaming company behind Tencent and Sony.
Microsoft’s Xbox game console is driving subscription service Game Pass. The goal is to transform Game Pass into the gaming industry’s equivalent of Netflix and now includes the Activision Blizzard stable.
Activision Blizzard has approximately 10,000 employees. CEO Bobby Kotick will continue in his position until the end of the year when he and several other top executives will step down.
Microsoft initially expected the acquisition of Activision Blizzard to be completed by July but was unable to obtain antitrust approval. The immense scale of the transaction, attracted antitrust challenges in the EU, US and UK, with Microsoft making several concessions
In the second quarter of 2023, Microsoft reported a 10 percent YoY revenue increase to US$56.2 billion and a 23 percent net profit increase to US$20.1 billion. Activision Blizzard recorded a 34 percent revenue increase to US$2.21 billion and with net profit increase of US$587 million.
