The planned mega takeover of the video game company Activision Blizzard by Microsoft has been blocked by British competition watchdogs. The reason is concern that the approximately $ 69 billion deal could distort competition in the growing market for cloud gaming.
This was announced by the supervisory authority CMA on Wednesday. It is already the second major hurdle for the takeover announced at the beginning of 2022: In the USA, the FTC regulator is suing. Microsoft wants to appeal the decision, as the company announced to the financial service Bloomberg, among others.
Microsoft wants to appeal the blockade
Microsoft has a strong position in the video game business played over the Internet. The CMA analysis found that holding back Activision Blizzard game titles for just one cloud service could be commercially advantageous for the Xbox group. The British competition authorities had previously put their initial concerns about the console market into perspective.