Sony have no incentive to strike a deal with MS. They have said multiple times they want the deal dead, and with the FTC block, the CMA largely talking the same as the FTC, its almost irrelevant what the EU does if the CMA blocks or asks for divestiture.
A CMA block is game over for this deal. There is no recourse, and Sony are very close to getting it.
I find it incredibly likely ATVI/MSFT want divestiture, even if they did, there are a handful of companies interested that could buy Activision or Activision+Blizzard, many of whom might run into similar anti-trust problems (Facebook, Amazon, Tencent, Sony).
(i) I agree with your assessment that this deal is dead without a Call of Duty deal. That gives Sony enormous negotiating power in that particular discussion. I expect something close to perpetuity
(ii) Having achieved second stage investigations from the three key regulators, Sony has no need to mount a public campaign to object to the deal. I would not read much into their new found reticence
(iii) It’s unclear to me that a disposal of Blizzard will be a sufficient structural remedy
Sony have no incentive to strike a deal with MS. They have said multiple times they want the deal dead, and with the FTC block, the CMA largely talking the same as the FTC, its almost irrelevant what the EU does if the CMA blocks or asks for divestiture.
A CMA block is game over for this deal. There is no recourse, and Sony are very close to getting it.
I find it incredibly likely ATVI/MSFT want divestiture, even if they did, there are a handful of companies interested that could buy Activision or Activision+Blizzard, many of whom might run into similar anti-trust problems (Facebook, Amazon, Tencent, Sony).
A couple of further observations:
(i) I agree with your assessment that this deal is dead without a Call of Duty deal. That gives Sony enormous negotiating power in that particular discussion. I expect something close to perpetuity
(ii) Having achieved second stage investigations from the three key regulators, Sony has no need to mount a public campaign to object to the deal. I would not read much into their new found reticence
(iii) It’s unclear to me that a disposal of Blizzard will be a sufficient structural remedy