Microsoft will appeal UK CMA’s decision to block Activision Blizzard deal

Microsoft has announced it plans to appeal today’s decision by the UK Competition and Markets Authority to block the company’s planned $69 billion acquisition of game publisher Activision Blizzard.

In a Twitter post, Microsoft Vice Chairman and President Brad Smith sent out this statement:

We remain fully committed to this acquisition and will appeal. The CMA’s decision rejects a pragmatic path to address competition concerns and discourages technology innovation and investment in the United Kingdom. We have already signed contracts to make Activision Blizzard’s popular games available on 150 million more devices, and we remain committed to reinforcing these agreements through regulatory remedies. We’re especially disappointed that after lengthy deliberations, this decision appears to reflect a flawed understanding of this market and the way the relevant cloud technology actually works.

Microsoft did make a number of deals with rival cloud gaming services worldwide recently, including with NVIDIA Geforce Now, Boosteroid, and Ubitus, to make its games, and Activision Blizzard’s games, available on those services for at least 10 years.

However, that apparently was not enough for the UK CMA, who stated that Microsoft’s deals were “not sufficiently open to providers who might wish to offer versions of games on PC operating systems other than Windows.”