Microsoft recently announced the biggest takeover in its history and, logically, US regulators are looking to take a closer look. At the same time, the firm has revealed that it will be making changes to its Game Pass subscriptions to satisfy requests from British authorities. Simple coincidence or gamble on the part of Redmond?
FTC to investigate Microsoft takeover of Activision Blizzard
The Federal Trade Commission (FTC) will be responsible for studying the acquisition of Activision Blizzard by Microsoft for 68.7 billion dollars. The agency will in particular be interested in the possible harmful repercussions of the takeover on Microsoft’s competitors in the gaming sector.
Indeed, the Activision catalog is very complete and includes extremely popular titles and franchises. If for now, Microsoft has not unveiled specific plans for the future of the studio, for example if games from it would be marketed exclusively on Xbox, you should know that Sony’s PlayStation is no longer sold. than its Microsoft counterpart, but also that a significant portion of Activision’s revenue comes from PlayStation gamers, notes Engadget.
After Microsoft and Activision, Sony buys Bungie for 3.6 billion dollars
One thing is obvious, Microsoft’s subscription services are essential to all of its gaming efforts; this of course includes the acquisition of Activision, whose games should be integrated into Microsoft’s offers.
The acquisition of Activision Blizzard is the biggest in Microsoft’s history. Photography: Dimitris Chapsoulas / Unsplash
The Game Pass in the sights of the British regulator
Precisely, the media The Verge reports that the Xbox manufacturer has just agreed to modify various criteria for its gaming subscriptions to respond to concerns from the Competition and Markets Authority (CMA), the British body responsible for monitoring anti-competitive practices. This was particularly concerned with dormant subscriptions, that is to say people paying a monthly subscription to Microsoft but without using the service.
Thus, Microsoft will contact people who pay for an Xbox Live Gold or Game Pass subscription but have not used it for at least a year. She will then tell them how to stop their payments if they want to opt out. If these people continue to shell out money each month without using their subscription for 12 consecutive months, the company will eventually stop payments. Additionally, Microsoft has agreed to offer better up-front information about subscriptions, including clear details about automatic renewals, when subscriptions will renew, how much people will pay, and a way to get a refund. they accidentally renew their subscription.
If initially, these changes will be made in the United Kingdom, the Redmond firm ensures that they will then be deployed to the rest of the world. ” Players should receive clear and timely information to make informed choices when purchasing auto-renewing memberships and subscriptions. We are therefore pleased that Microsoft has made these formal commitments to the CMA to improve the fairness of its practices and protect consumers, and that it is offering refunds to certain customers. said Michael Grenfell, CMA’s Executive Director of Enforcement.
Microsoft remains confident
Microsoft’s announcement in relation to Game Pass is timely: the company can thus show all its goodwill with the FTC by complying directly with the requirements of another regulator.
However, succeeding in convincing the American agency will not be easy, whereas it has decided precisely to control more the mergers of companies since the arrival of Lina Khan at its head. Moreover, the difficulties encountered by Nvidia for the takeover of ARM are the perfect example of this. ultimately unsuccessful.