The $68.7 billion deal would be Microsoft’s biggest takeover ever and the biggest deal in video game history. The acquisition would make Microsoft the world’s third-largest gaming company by revenue, behind Tencent and Sony. Microsoft’s biggest rival in the video game sector indeed has reason to worry regarding such a big change in the sector.
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The acquisition of Activision Blizzard by Microsoft has been and remains an earthquake in the industry that affects other businesses as well. Above all: Sony. The stock market of the manufacturer of the PlayStation has literally crashed and one wonders if it will recover quickly.
Sony accuses the blow
As you might expect, Sony (and its PlayStation) is the big loser of a takeover of Activision Blizzard by Microsoft. As a result, Sony stock currently knows only one direction: down. As you can see in the screenshot below, Sony’s stock fell 12% on the Tokyo Stock Exchange, and things are not looking any better on the New York Stock Exchange where the Japanese group is also followed.
On the one hand, this is due to the fact that Sony has nothing (for the moment) to counter the Xbox Game Pass, which will soon be even more attractive, and on the other hand, that the PlayStation risks losing important Activision Blizzard games.
Sony stays ahead of Microsoft despite everything
Note, however, that Sony’s PlayStation Plus service, which costs 60 euros per year or 8.99 euros per month, had 47.2 million subscribers as of September 30, 2021, which still gives it an advantage over Microsoft, being given that Game Pass currently has 25 million subscribers.
Moreover, the PlayStation 5 from Sony, launched in late 2020 around the same time as Microsoft’s last Xbox, proved popular and a very nice commercial success, and Sony’s only problem was making enough of them to keep up with demand for the global shortage of semiconductors.
PlayStation has helped make Sony stock one of the biggest risers on the stock market in recent months. The action of the Sony group, on the Tokyo Stock Exchange, increased by 92% between the beginning of 2020 and last week.
It is clear, however, that the Activision group provides some of the most popular games for PlayStation, such as the popular series Call of Duty. It might, however, be an important consideration for antitrust regulators in the United States and abroad who are likely to review Microsoft’s acquisition, including whether that acquisition is likely to be an unfair advantage to Sony.
Microsoft still partners with Sony for the cloud
Sony did not react to Microsoft’s announcement, the Japanese group nevertheless mentioned the partnership between the two companies. In May 2019, the two big rivals in the home console market, Microsoft and Sony, announced a partnership for online services.
This partnership provides for the co-development of cloud solutions in Microsoft Azure. They will be used by their respective services in the video game and streaming markets via the PlayStation and Xbox brands. The agreement also provides for the exploration of collaboration in the fields of artificial intelligence and semiconductors.
With the acquisition of Activision Blizzard, Microsoft does not hide the fact that it is an additional asset in its race for the metaverse which comes at the right time. And a way to show that the situation has changed:…
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