The $68B acquisition of Activision Blizzard by Microsoft just cracked public daylight as the anti-competitive authority of Saudi Arabia tweeted its approval of the deal yesterday.
According to the tweet from the General Authority for Competition (GAC) enforcement agency, it “declares that it has no objection to completing the process of economic concentration between: Microsoft Corporation – Activision Blizzard Inc,” via Google translate.
تعلن #الهيئة_العامة_للمنافسة عن عدم ممانعتها من إتمام عملية التركز الاقتصادي بين:
-مايكروسوفت كوربوريشن
-أكتيفيجن بليزارد إنك pic.twitter.com/lo5scC3F7k— الهيئة العامة للمنافسة (@SaudiGAC) August 21, 2022
Saudi Arabia’s approval follows known inquisitions by the Council for Economic Defense (CADE) in Brazil which unearthed a rough estimate of Xbox One sold during its investigation of the deal, the FTC in North America taking a closer look into the merger and the UK CMA setting forth a timeline that could see a verdict as early as September 1, 2022.
Microsoft has quite a long road ahead of itself as it seeks to assuage concerns about its $68B buy-out of Activision from over 100 consumer protection agencies.
While Saudi Arabia stands as one of the first to publicly announce its approval of Microsoft’s acquisition of Activision Blizzard there are other agencies that have given their backing of the deal such as the Communications Workers of America (CWA) which seeks to hold the company accountable with a labor neutrality pact to ensure more pro-union policies post-acquisition.
Microsoft has charted a mid-summer 2023 date as its target timeline for the completion and final approvals of the Activision Blizzard deal.
