Microsoft’s never-ending endeavour to purchase Activision Blizzard for more money than the going rate of your average island is now facing its third roadblock in three months as New Zealand has entered the chat to voice its concerns about the deal.
Since April, the $69 billion acquisition has been up in the air after the British Competition and Markets Authority blocked the deal based on antitrust grounds.
This started a trend, and just a few weeks later, the Federal Trade Commission filed for an injunction which resulted in the federal courts temporarily preventing Microsoft from completing the purchase, at least until the court rules on the filing at the end of June.
Microsoft has been pushing back against the Federal Trade Commission’s attempt to block the acquisition. Still, in doing so, another layer has been added to this saga. In an appeal, lawyers representing a group of gamers suing to block the deal have pointed to a redacted internal Microsoft email that the lawyers say shows evidence that Microsoft is planning on pushing PlayStation out of the market.
We don’t know what the email contains as it is redacted. However, the lawyers representing the case claim that the email was sent back in 2019 by the head of Xbox game studios, Matt Booty, to Tim Stuart, Microsoft’s chief financial officer. The email in question is part of a sealed document that Microsoft’s attorneys have been fighting to keep sealed.
In legal documents, Microsoft stated that the email was part of a private, internal exchange. Microsoft also said that this email has no bearing on the court’s decisions, so it should not be entered into evidence for the courts. It’s worth noting that whatever was said in the redacted email preceded Microsoft’s 2022 bid to buy Activision Blizzard.
That’s not the end of the drama, either. This morning, New Zealand’s Commerce Commission joined the growing list of legal and regulatory obstacles after issuing a preliminary report of its probe into the deal, which includes numerous concerns.
According to the Commerce Commission, the probe focused on determining whether Microsoft’s act of buying Activision Blizzard has a material impact on the competition in the cloud gaming space.
However, that’s not to say that everyone is against the transaction. Microsoft has already gotten approvals from countries worldwide, including the European Union, China, and South Korea, to mention a few.
As it stands now, the New Zealand Commerce Commission has until the 17th of July to confirm whether or not it will join the list of approving countries.