NEW YORK, United States —
Microsoft announced
Tuesday a landmark $69 billion deal to buy
US gaming giant Activision Blizzard,
boosting its power in video games by scooping up the scandal-hit "Call of
Duty" maker.
اضافة اعلان
Merging with troubled but highly successful
Activision will make Microsoft the third-largest gaming company by revenue,
behind Tencent and Sony, Microsoft said, a major shift in the booming world of
games.
"Gaming is the most dynamic and
exciting category in entertainment across all platforms today and will play a
key role in the development of metaverse platforms," Microsoft CEO Satya
Nadella said, referring to the virtual reality vision for the internet's
future.
Activision, the California-based maker of
"Candy Crush," has been hit by employee protests, departures, and a
state lawsuit alleging it enabled toxic workplace conditions and sexual
harassment against women.
Over the past seven months the company has
received about 700 reports of employee concerns over sexual assault, harassment
or other misconduct, in some cases separate reports about the same incident,
The Wall Street Journal has reported.
Nearly 20 percent of Activision Blizzard's
9,500 employees have signed a petition calling for CEO Bobby Kotick to resign.
Kotick will continue to serve as CEO of
Activision Blizzard, but once the deal closes the company will report to Phil
Spencer, head of Microsoft Gaming.
The transaction -- which is expected to
close in fiscal year 2023 — is subject to customary closing conditions,
regulatory review and Activision Blizzard's shareholder approval.
"Acquiring Activision will help jump
start Microsoft's broader gaming endeavors and ultimately its move into the
metaverse with gaming the first monetization piece of the metaverse in our
opinion," Wedbush analysts said after the news broke.
Troubled Activision
"With Activision's stock under heavy
pressure (CEO related issues/overhang) over the last few months, Microsoft
viewed this as the window of opportunity to acquire a unique asset that can
propel its consumer strategy forward," Wedbush added.
Microsoft has just marked 20 years of the
"Halo" video game franchise that turned its Xbox console into a hit.
Xbox remains a key player in a video game
industry now thought to be larger than the movie sector, with market research
firm Mordor Intelligence valuing it at $173.7 billion in 2020.
The sector is booming with publisher
Take-Two announcing a deal last week to acquire "Farmville" creator
Zynga for $12.7 billion, in a major mobile gaming push by the maker of
"Grand Theft Auto."
Troubles, meanwhile, have stacked up for
Activision over its sex harassment and discrimination scandal.
In July, California state regulators accused
the company of condoning a culture of harassment, a toxic work environment, and
inequality.
In September the
Securities and Exchange Commission launched a probe into the company over "disclosures regarding
employment matters and related issues."
And two months later the Journal reported
that Kotick, accused of mishandling the harassment complaints, had signaled he
would consider stepping down if he failed to quicky fix the company culture. He
has led the company for more than three decades.
Late last year chief operating officer
Daniel Alegre pledged a 50 percent increase in female and non-binary staff over
the next five years so that they will account for more than a third of
Activision's workers.
Microsoft CEO Nadella spoke of safe and
inclusivity in his statement announcing the Activision deal.
"We're investing deeply in world-class
content, community and the cloud to usher in a new era of gaming that puts
players and creators first and makes gaming safe, inclusive and accessible to
all," he wrote.
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