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Comment by tosh | Hacker News Reader

How could closing the deal look like in practice while the UK is blocking it? Would that mean Microsoft can't sell Activision Blizzard games in the UK?

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This is just from eyeballing the top results of some Google searching so may not be super accurate, but it looks like the console games market is around $34 billion a year in the US, $11 billion a year in the EU, and under $1 billion a year in the UK.

The merger has been approved by EU and now US regulators.

The UK market might be small enough compared to the US and the EU that Microsoft and Activision might find it worthwhile to just leave the UK console game market if they had to choose between that and not being able to complete the merger.

I would suspect the CMA would view Activision exiting the UK market, if owned by Microsoft, as a major consumer harm.

It was already approved there too now

When did that happen? On the dedicated CMA page[0] about the inquiry I see nothing since the draft final order[1] in May, which absolutely does not approve it. Quote:

On 5 May 2023, the CMA made an Interim Order pursuant to section 81 of the Act preventing each of Microsoft and Activision and all members of their Groups of Interconnected Bodies Corporate from acquiring in the other any interest conferring control within the meaning of section 26 of the Act

[0] https://www.gov.uk/cma-cases/microsoft-slash-activision-bliz...

[1] https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/media/6465ec16e1407...

Grandparent jumped the gun a bit, but the CMA sees the writing on the wall and agreed to negotiate this morning.

https://www.theverge.com/2023/7/11/23791149/microsoft-activi...

Ah apologies, I read the original news article incorrectly it seems.

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