As others have already said in here, probably a lot of dirty laundry will get aired.
Microsoft acquired Activision Blizzard King for $69 Billion on 2023-10-13
- Thread starter Rangers
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All my thoughts now.
If it went to independent court could get a clear ruling.
It also means that the UK CMA or EC could easily fall in line with this especially when you hear what the CMA has said up to now.
FTC dragging it out and even if you think you can win in courts, this could be long winded and costs money and time.
Hence why most companies may drop it at this point even if they thought they would win.
But this doesn't kill the deal, but can't be ignored either.
Yes Warren go after a pro union company. Makes a 100% sense
I am sure it is , but the fact that there would be a union amongst gaming companies and now possibly 2 is much better than none. Of course warren has a long career of not knowing what she is talking about
Exactly what I was referring to earlier where ideology is picked regardless of the realities.
administrative complaint (23 pages)
Silent_Buddha
Legend
They aren't seeking an injunction because that involves taking it to a Federal Court which has jurisdiction over mergers. They know they will lose if they do that. Thus they are first going to handle it internally and their hope is that at some point in the future they'll actually have some evidence that this is harmful to consumers.
But as is, if they seek an injunction and take it to Federal Court, they'll lose rather quickly and Lina Khan will lose yet another case in a string of cases that the FTC has lost under her watch.
Regards,
SB
Their president is certainly expecting this to go to court eventually ...
Might not make it out of that internal FTC court before the entire personnel is switched over, and then possibly the entire thing is dropped by new administration.
They better hope that there's a new administration in place, preferably the current opposition coalition but that might require Microsoft to take an actual political stand to make it happen ...
Silent_Buddha
Legend
Sure and they are rightly confident that they (Microsoft) will win if it does. The FTC also knows that Microsoft would win, which is why they are not seeking an injunction because that means it has to go to Federal Court. They are hoping that either Microsoft caves and abandons the merger (they won't) or that some miraculous new evidence will be presented that will give them even a slim chance to win in court.
If the FTC felt they had even a slim chance in hell that they could win, they'd take it to court and seek an injunction.
The problem with the current head of the FTC is that they are more concerned with changing the law (Congress' domain) or enforcing the law (The Judiciary Branch's domain) how they interpret the law (very broadly and incorrectly) rather than ensuring that companies comply with the law and assisting companies with complying with laws that are associated with Trade (basically the Executive branch who is tasked with enacting the law).
But the current FTC under Lina Khan really isn't talking to businesses or working with businesses to help them comply with the law.
Now members of the FTC commission are appointed by the President. So it is political to a certain extent and can be seen as an extension of the Executive Branch. So previous FTC commissions could subtly shape business and trade in the US to push the President of the United States agenda. But they would do it within the bounds of the law and uses concessions for things that fall outside the bounds of the law and power of the FTC. But they still assisted companies with staying in compliance and still had open dialog with companies and acted rationally and consistently.
The current FTC has closed many of those communications channels and pretty much neutered themselves by going with a scorched earth "all or nothing" approach. Not content to try to shape business behavior through concessions to avoid potentially being taken to court, they are in stop all acquisitions by large corporations mode and will accept nothing less. This means they've voluntarily given up any of the power that the FTC actually had WRT altering or affecting how companies behave.
That leads to them (current FTC) losing most cases they bring to court because the law doesn't care if a large corporation gets larger. The law only cares if it's done in such a way that it will result in the consumer being harmed or if it's being done in an unlawful manner.
The law protects the consumers of businesses, it does not protect businesses (competitors) when it comes to mergers and acquisitions as long as the merger/acquisition is being done lawfully.
Regards,
SB
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If they truly believe that they share the same political values then they will respectfully concede without prolonging this feud like a certain other corporation did recently when they dropped their bid to acquire a chip designer ...
If they don't then they should carefully pick their political sides like Oracle and Elon Musk did. The tech industry should've been divided between political lines from the start ...
If they don't then they should carefully pick their political sides like Oracle and Elon Musk did. The tech industry should've been divided between political lines from the start ...
Activision Blizzard: US seeks to block Microsoft's $69bn acquisition
Microsoft said it would fight to buy Activision Blizzard, the studio behind games such as Call of Duty.
www.bbc.com
Seems like FTC is has MS as a gotcha with respect to the EUs understanding of the Bethesda merger.
SCOTUS is hearing a case about the FTC/SEC due process. Some say they appear to be leaning against FTC/SEC, which would let companies go directly to Federal Court or expediate the process.
This could have an impact on this acquisition.
www.scotusblog.com
This could have an impact on this acquisition.
Justices seem receptive to opening up early challenges to agency proceedings - SCOTUSblog
The justices heard nearly three hours of arguments Monday in a pair of cases challenging the traditional framework of agency review: Axon Enterprise v. Federal Trade Commission and Securities and Exchange Commission v. Cochran. If those arguments tell us anything, several justices are strongly incli
www.scotusblog.com
SCOTUS is hearing a case about the FTC/SEC due process. Some say they appear to be leaning against FTC/SEC, which would let companies go directly to Federal Court or expediate the process.
This could have an impact on this acquisition.
Justices seem receptive to opening up early challenges to agency proceedings - SCOTUSblog
The justices heard nearly three hours of arguments Monday in a pair of cases challenging the traditional framework of agency review: Axon Enterprise v. Federal Trade Commission and Securities and Exchange Commission v. Cochran. If those arguments tell us anything, several justices are strongly incli
SCOTUS is definitely friendly to big business.
So if it reached the SCOTUS, it would likely be a good sign for the merger.
But big merger cases or breakups of big conglomerates rarely do.
The AT&T breakup didn't go to the SCOTUS and other big merger cases didn't.
Don't assume Republican president would necessarily be more receptive to mergers. Trump wanted to stop an AT&T merger to acquire Warner Brothers because WB owned CNN, which he hated.
But really, people want Republicans back in charge in Washington, when they've been horrible on tech issues (net neutrality gone or any of the number of things done under Republican FCC chairmen like Ajit Pai?).
That's some loyalty to a console company.
They're against Big Tech that speaks out against them. I don't see Microsoft falling on that side of the line. They don't own any social media platforms and don't own any news broadcasters.
The most frustrating aspect is how both parties have some really bad policies which impact technology advancement.
I see folks wanting more reasonable folks in office regardless of party affiliation.
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