MADRID, 28 AUGUST (EUROPA PRESS) –

Microsoft chairman Brad Smith believes the Redmond company has worked “very hard” to address concerns raised by some of its competitors about a takeover of Activision Blizzard and it is now up to regulators, particularly in the UK, to determine whether the path is clear.

“We are working hard to address the concerns raised by some of our competitors, but I think there is a way out. It is up to the regulators, especially in the UK, to decide if that way is clear,” Smith said in an interview with the CNBC network.

Last week, Microsoft and Activision tabled a new merger deal for UK Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) approval, after UK regulators determined that the initial deal, valued at around 69,000 million dollars (69,354 million euros), would be blocked to protect innovation and options in cloud games.

In this way, the new restructuring agreement proposed by the company will undergo a new investigation by the UK regulator, which will be carried out according to the usual process and the legal deadline for making a decision is 18 October 2023. .

“As CMA UK said, no green light yet, but they will be reviewing our proposal. And I hope by mid-October we can make that happen,” said the Microsoft president, representing now “we have to let the regulators speak for themselves.”

“In my view, what we are really trying to do is take these concerns seriously. We haven’t tried to ignore it. We haven’t tried to belittle it. We have worked on addressing them, and by addressing them, we have made a transaction that will encourage competition and at the same time remove the concerns that some people have,” he defended.

Under a restructuring deal proposed last week, Microsoft will no longer acquire the cloud rights to existing Activision games on PC and consoles, or new games released by Activision over the next 15 years (excluding the European Economic Area). .

Instead, the rights will be sold to French company Ubisoft Entertainment before Microsoft acquires Activision.

In this way, Ubisoft will be able to license Activision’s content in different business models, including subscription services, in addition to giving the French company the ability to require Microsoft to offer versions of games on operating systems other than Windows.

On July 19, Microsoft and Activision Blizzard agreed to extend the deadline for closing purchases by the giant Redmond studio responsible for video games such as the ‘Call of Duty’ saga to October 18.

The transaction, which was agreed to at around $69,000 million in January 2022, originally set a closing date of July 18, 2023.