• by Laurie Sullivan  @lauriesullivan, July 11, 2023

After a long, drawn-out process, Microsoft finally secured the approval of the U.S. court to acquire video game-maker Activision Blizzard for $68.7 billion in an all-cash deal it initially announced in January 2022.

A U.S. judge in June granted the Federal Trade Commission's (FTC) request to temporarily block Microsoft acquisition of Activision Blizzard and set a hearing date of this week. The hearing, based on the FTC's request for a preliminary injunction, delayed the closure of the deal.

But on Tuesday, a federal judge approved the acquisition by declining to block the deal that regulators said would hurt competition. U.S. District Judge Jacqueline Scott Corley said in a ruling the FTC, which enforces antitrust laws, has not shown a likelihood it would win if it took the case to trial. The decision paves the way for the multibillion-dollar deal to close as soon as this month, depending on the outcome of a U.K. regulator's ruling.

Microsoft on Tuesday also reached an agreement with U.K. regulators to pause a separate legal battle over the merger. The U.K. Competition and Markets Authority had blocked the purchase in April over competition concerns.

In the U.S. ruling, within a highly redacted document, Corley cited Microsoft’s commitment to several concessions such as keep Call of Duty on PlayStation for 10 years, in equivalence with Xbox. Microsoft also made an agreement with Nintendo to bring the game to Nintendo Switch.

Activision Blizzard CEO Bobby Kotick stated the merger would “enable competition rather than allow entrenched market leaders to continue to dominate our rapidly growing industry.”