Microsoft has settled a lawsuit over its $69 billion purchase it made last year Activision Blizzard brought forward by Call of Duty players.
In end of 2022the 10 gamers (who lived in California, New Mexico, and New Jersey) filed a private lawsuit against the Xbox maker. At the time, they wanted to prevent Microsoft from having “enormous market power.”
According to the Hollywood reporterboth sides told the California court that they wanted to dismiss the lawsuit “with prejudice” and that it could not be refiled later. A lawyer handling the case said each group will “bear its own costs and fees.”
Notably, the terms of the deal were not disclosed.
During the trial, players would argue that Microsoft would harm competition with its acquisition and cite recent events as its many layoffs this yearand the price increased for Xbox Game Pass.
Following the merger, Game Pass's subscriber base grew from 25 million to over 34 millionit is the highest in two years. Several Activision games have come to the service in recent months, and Call of Duty: Black Ops 6 will launch day one on Game Pass.
Joseph Saveri, an attorney for the players, said in a statement that Microsoft “continued to increase its market power” after the acquisition. And for Game Pass in particular, he noted that the service “continues to trend toward a monopoly.”
In response, Microsoft disputed the characterization and said that Game Pass subscriber growth was a “meaningless apples-to-oranges comparison.”
An account of Microsoft's attempt to purchase Activision Blizzard
The road to acquiring Activision Blizzard was a long one for Microsoft, particularly in a legal sense.
At first, various regulatory committees such as the FTC and the UK CMA objected. They were worried about a potential monopoly and what it might mean for the future of video games with cloud.
The FTC (e.g Sony) were particularly determined so that the merger does not go through. After a trial in the United States and cloud-related concessionsregulators e courts ultimately sided in favor of Microsoft, while also recognizing his recent controversial moves.
This past weekend marked more than a year since the Microsoft-Activision Blizzard merger.