After agreeing on a very premium price Microsoft is buying Activision Blizzard making it the 3rd biggest gaming company in the world.
This new purchase will make Microsoft the 3rd largest gaming company in the world only behind Tencent (they own games like LoL) and Sony. As they also recently, well about a year ago, bought out Bethesda as well. If you like how they handle games, this is great news as Blizzard has recently been very much in the news, and not for good reason (we’ll touch on that later).
The news was broken by the Wall Street Journal and they even speculated at a price point of nearly $70 billion. This is actually a very high price for the company as its market cap was only about $59 billion.
Microsoft Buying Activision Blizzard!
The deal closed at $95 per share, which is well above the $65.39 current price. This could be due to most game companies falling recently and the current controversy with Blizzard. Obviously, when Microsoft buys companies, they don’t like to sit around and let the games hang dead. Which is good news for anyone who likes Blizzard games.
Who knows? Maybe this will even mean something crazy, like a new Starcraft (or at least more balance patches than one every few years). Here’s what the CEO Satya Nadella had to say about the acquisition:
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. 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.
They also mentioned that Activision Blizzard CEO Bobby Kotick will stay on through the process. We’re not sure if this is good or not, we’ll have to wait to see how it plays out. Lastly, there is no word yet whether the games will go exclusively to the Xbox platforms.
Blizzard’s Recent Issues
With the recent lawsuit that has really been revealing of the company’s work environment. The suit alleges a fratboy culture where women are harassed and have a hard time moving up in the company. Obviously, this hurt the company’s image quite greatly and might have prompted the sale.
Along with a falling stock price, there have been some serious issues. Usually, these big sales take a serious amount of time, so it’s hard to say if they agreed upon the price and everything before this all came about and that’s why the sale price is so high. It’s hard to say, but this could be a good thing for both companies as it might change the culture and get the games better than ever.
Here’s what Microsoft had to say about the issues facing Blizzard:
As a company, Microsoft is committed to our journey for inclusion in every aspect of gaming, among both employees and players. We deeply value individual studio cultures. We also believe that creative success and autonomy go hand-in-hand with treating every person with dignity and respect. We hold all teams, and all leaders, to this commitment. We’re looking forward to extending our culture of proactive inclusion to the great teams across Activision Blizzard.
Do you think Microsoft buying Activision Blizzard is a good thing?
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About the Author: Travis Pasch
