Report: Microsoft, ActiBlizz & The FTC Yet To Begin 'Substantive' Settlement Talks

This is probably going to drag into 2024

Thought I saw something about the FTC quietly making a new "high power console market" distinction, effectively neutering MS' whole "we'd bring CoD to Switch and keep it on steam" thing and making this whole deal strictly about how the deal would effect Sony

I don't know about anyone else but I was actually looking forward to more of the Acti-Bliz / Microsoft drama....After all we heard nothing since, ahem, last year 😉

Just let it end!!

The FTC we're the ones that refused to let Microsoft sit down and talk in the first place.

@Sol4ris
...
Well played

@abe_hikura

Thought I saw something about the FTC quietly making a new "high power console market" distinction, effectively neutering MS' whole "we'd bring CoD to Switch

The FTC could try and do that, but their fallacy will be exposed in two seconds by the fact that COD is on Mobiles and it would also mean that they somehow know how Nintendo will be designing their consoles for decades into the future. Yeah talk about neutered arguments😂. They'll be laughed out of courts, assuming they even consider what you suggested.

My understanding is that MS are waiting on the CMA and EU, and if they approve it with concessions, those concessions will be offered to the FTC and likely accepted without a trial, by the wording used at the pretrial. It's all eyes on the cma and eu for the next step

@Sol4ris yeah, I think that's how they plan on fighting this at court, presenting this as a Xbox vs PS instead of the games industry as a whole.

@Moonglow
The FTC is trying to remove Nintendo, but any judge will see they all compete against each other, and the "high prrformance" market is illusional marked made up by the FTC to justify their point. Thats one of the many reasons the FTC will be destroyed at a neutral federal court, that isnt pursuing a political agenda

Very well put, that is how I see it as well. I'm all for regulators doing their job but this would be nothing more than make belive factors invented by the FTC to make up for their past failings. And it will go nowhere, as it should.

The most likely outcome is that we will wait to see what the CMA and EU courts rule and any 'concessions' they are made to offer there will be used to appease the FTC. If the determine that the steps taken by MS are 'NOT' cause for concern and allow the deal to 'conclude', then it will be put back to FTC to 'prove' in court that the deal is 'harmful', whilst MS will have the 'backing' of the rest of the world.

They could still attempt to 'block' or most likely drop the case they know they couldn't win. It should all be 'concluded' by April 15th from EU/CMA perspective and around the world, so the only stumbling block would be whether the FTC wishes to proceed and MS will 'fight' in court.

We all know the FTC's argument is very weak so I doubt they would 'win' so its more about 'delaying' the inevitable. The judge knows that the deal has already passed in various other countries so the FTC's claims were 'weakened'...

It looks like this'll be tied up for a while in a few different countries. Until it's sorted in the major markets then it won't go through in the current form so I wouldn't hold your breath for any impact to gamers this year.

I wish that MS hadn't bothered, and this whole deal will dissolve. If it does fall through it could be good precedent against other large gaming mergers in the future as a few companies swallow up competitors.

It took just 4 days of the new year to get our first "click" article of this drama 😑

Yep both sides are waiting on the results of UK and EU. Once that is settled both sides will know how to proceed. MS is not offering any settlements until it knows what EU and UK are expecting from them. If concessions are needed in those markets MS will offer those to FTC.

I actually think it is resolved this summer.

@UltimateOtaku91 well, it is "news" after all. If you're fed up reading the articles about it, you don't have to "click" on it, do you? Just ignore it and move on.

The articles are new information that many people find interesting to read through, unlike the boring and mundane comments constantly moaning about them. Don't you realise that your comments constitute engagement, regardless of their content, and therefore promote more articles on the subject?

This is going to court, and it will be laughed out of court. Sony is lucky that Europe had their interests in mind because the FTC is incompetent.

The FTC is ridiculous. What else can you expect from an unqualified leader who writes a thesis about her own contempt for Big Tech.

This whole thing is ridiculous. Sony has been market leader since they joined the industry. They throw a fit when someone wants to make market more competitive and get their way. sad

@JaffeGaffe I want this deal to go through as much as most Xbox-centric gamers do but commenting on a news article, with a significant portion of your comment being an absolutely nonsensical, rabid, anti-Playsytation rant in caps, does nothing. Maybe you should take a wee chill pill and not go out of your mind? Toxic fanboyism to the extreme.

The case of Microsoft and ABK vs The Federal Trade Commission is one of my most anticipated Xbox releases this year. The lore drops on the Microsoft and Sony factions are going to be nuts.

@Sol4ris
A market can be defined however a court is willing to define it.

Personally, the xbox series s kind of negates the high powered console argument though as both the series x and s are marketed together.

@Moonglow That and I don't think consoles can even count as "the high performance market" when it comes to gaming, it seems like that has always been exclusively the PC gaming market. I mean what is going to be more high-end, a $500 game console made to spec, or a high-end custom PC that costs thousands of dollars with the latest high-end components.

The console market is the console market, and that is going to include Nintendo no matter how the FTC tries the weasel them out of the discussion. I mean they are currently the leader in the gaming industry with a significant lead on console sales and userbase, it's going to be hard to completely eliminate them from the discussion.

Then there's Apple who nearly represents half the entire gaming industry these days along with Google, because yes, mobile gaming is that big. Sony really isn't that big of a factor when you honestly evaluate the entirety of the gaming industry and crunch the numbers.

I'm pretty sure making a "deal" with an FTC that openly stated they're simply against all big tech mergers isn't going to happen and I'm pretty sure MS is very much interested in exposing at much detail of industry backroom deals as possible in courts that all but certainly favor any and all mergers. Why make concessions to a hostile group that doesn't even want to hear it when the courts are basically guaranteed to throw the case out entirely and it exposes Sonys questionable business arrangements in the process.

I'm as against big tech getting bigger as the FTC leader but this case with no basis is not a way to do anything about that. It's a good way to set things back and cement the status quo by ensuring any legitimate challenge is considered untenable. But hey it bolsters her political career so that's worth collapsing a free market or two!

@abe_hikura Only government can create arbitrary definitions of markets simply to suit their own claims by simply crafting a sub category that manages to omit the actual market leader to define it. What's next a category that consists of only consoles containing a minimum of 3 instances of the letter 'X'?

Microsoft are said to be moving along with the EU and UK commissions, working towards approval. It is only the FTC who are the block now. I hope it goes to court as the FTC hasn’t a leg to stand on, they will lose, again, like they have with lots of other cases that have gone to court, because they are constantly going beyond the law and their remit to prove a ridiculous point. And costing the American tax payer millions every time I’d imagine.

Some have said it’s because the leader of the FTC has political ambitions and they believe this action helps them, I just think they are sour with a giant chip on their shoulders against ALL tech companies. They should be sacked and fined for lack of impartiality.

@Moonglow It won’t be game over at all. Microsoft will go to court as the CMA will have an incredibly weak case, they all do.

The 'deal' will close if/when they get the backing of the EU/CMA after agreeing any 'additional' concessions required to ensure it goes through. Of course, it could go through without 'additional' concessions as they have already put a 10yr contract on the table to bring CoD to 'more' platforms, not less...

If it goes through 'everywhere' else, then its up to the FTC or Judge to decide whether or not to take 'legal' action to stop the deal concluding by 'proving' that MS would be breaching anti-trust, anti-consumer or anti-competitive laws - all of which must be resolved by June 2023.

This was more about scheduling. All parties knowing the current timeline to 'schedule' any potential case. The FTC has to decide whether it thinks it has a 'case' to bring to Court. The FTC 'could' accept that MS has made 'enough' concessions to 'drop' the case, but if the EU/CMA demand 'more', then the FTC may accept their concessions too as a settlement to allow the deal to go through. If they accept that MS's current plans, no additional concessions, then the FTC can 'accept' them too as settlement or try to get more in court.

The more countries that allow the deal with the 'current' concession (10yrs guaranteed releases), the weaker the FTC case becomes. The fact that its passed in several territories with 'no' edicts to block, no currently known plans to 'block' in the EU/CMA, that makes the FTC look petty/bad. I doubt the FTC will take A/B and MS to court, they are more playing hardball to delay and/or get as much concessions from MS as they possibly can. As soon as its passed 'everywhere', the FTC will probably accept that they have no case.

Its not just the rulings of other anti-competitive organisations around the globe that 'support' MS, but they also have the backing of some big Unions and other Platforms - Steam, Nintendo as well as testimony from their 'competitors' (EA, Ubisoft, TenCent etc). I still expect it to 'close', Its just whether it closes sooner (April) or later (June)...

@LoquaciousB Commenting on a comment...tsk tsk. You're no better than what you're acusing me of doing. That's projection

I hardly think so. Your comment reeked of console war toxicity and the site staff removed it due to your 'all in caps' rant. Given that it's taken you nearly a month to reply to my comment, it seems you're just spoiling for an argument so, I'll leave it there.