A federal court today has rendered a verdict on an appeal the FTC filed requesting an injunction against the Microsoft acquisition of Activision Blizzard. No, you haven’t traveled back in time.
ftc activision blizzard appeal
The 9th U.S. Court of San Fransisco has upheld the ruling of a lower court judge that stated the FTC was not entitled to a preliminary injunction. The FTC was attempting to stop Microsoft from Acquiring Activision Blizzard King. The deal was finalized back in 2023, showing how long the wheels of justice can take to turn in America.
Here is our original reporting from October 13th, 2023 on the finalization:
After nearly 2 years of regulatory back and forth between Microsoft, Activision, Sony, several other gaming companies and government agencies, Microsoft announced today that they have officially acquired Activision-Blizzard-King.
With ABK now under Microsoft, the company is the proprietor of a bounty of valuable IP, including Call of Duty and Diablo. Comments by CEO of Microsoft Gaming Phil Spencer suggest interest in reviving dormant IP in the Activision-Blizzard vault as well. These comments suggest the company may look to extract as much value as possible from their recently approved purchase that will undoubtedly help the growth of their gaming subscription Game Pass.