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After the stop of the Cma to the acquisition of Activision, the UK fears a Microsoft-Exit?

11 months ago babelfish

After the stop of the Cma to the acquisition of Activision, the UK fears a Microsoft-Exit?

For the president of Microsoft, the EU is now a more attractive place to do business than the United Kingdom. The Cma's decision to block the acquisition of Activision risks causing many capital to flee abroad and politics is already in turmoil. Revolution in sight for the British Antitrust?

Several analysts and some British videogame publications have traced the recent LinkedIn post by British Prime Minister Rishi Sunak to a response, not too indirect, to what the Competition and Markets Authority, better known as Cma, or the antitrust authority, would have "combined" of the United Kingdom, denying Microsoft permission to acquire Activision for approximately 70 billion with the risk of a possible monopoly of the Redmond house in the cloud gaming market.

REVOLUTION IN SIGHT FOR ANTITRUST UK?

At the moment, the hypothesis remains the same, given that Sunak , grappling with the post-Brexit economic crisis, is in fact looking for foreign capital and is therefore putting forward generic and non-targeted proposals concerning the need to "stimulate innovation, investments and growth by announcing two strategic decisions that will change the behavior of our regulatory bodies”. In this regard, however, he also speaks of "a strategic shift to the Competition and Markets Authority (Cma)" and ensures that "future regulations will be at the center of government decisions".

What is certain is that the situation has become slippery for the Cma, both because its decision could alienate the software houses involved and other multinationals from England and because, in the same hours, the European Commission – usually accused by the British to be too severe and want to operate an excessively invasive control in the life of the companies – has instead given its ok to the acquisition.

CMA'S SPEECH (IN DEFENSE) AT THE PARLIAMENT ON ACTIVISION

And so the leaders of Cma, represented by Marcus Bokkerink and Sarah Cardell , had to report to parliament, defending the reason for their "no" to the House of Redmond. A harsh meeting, played on the defensive, in which sparks were not lacking with the parliamentarians. "I understand the inference: when a decision is made that blocks a deal, the question is whether the UK is open for business," said CMA chairman Bokkerink. “Every business knows that there is a big difference between building a business, investing in a new business, investing in a startup, starting a new business – there is a big difference between this and the purchase of an already established, well-established company with established positions. The two things are not the same.

“The UK has always encouraged – and it is the CMA's job to encourage – open and competitive markets. We are attentive – as is our duty – to investments that consolidate an already entrenched market power.” When asked by the Business and Trade Committee why the CMA came to a different conclusion from that of the European Commission, executive Sarah Cardell said the difference lay in the authorities' refusal to accept Microsoft's suggested remedy of a 10-year deal to safeguard the 'emerging cloud gaming market.

"The European Commission agreed that the agreement would raise competition issues, there is no difference between the CMA and the European vision," Cardell told MPs, "but the Commission still concluded that it is appropriate to accept the remedy [of Microsoft]", referring to the various agreements concluded by Redmond to guarantee Activision's flagship titles even on consoles other than theirs. “They have their own test to apply and they have reached their point, and they have every right to reach it. But we remain of the view, from the UK's point of view, that it was not appropriate to accept that remedy.'

MICROSOFT'S PRESSURE ON UK POLITICS

The homeland of liberal theories was told by Brad Smith , president of Microsoft that with that decision "there is a clear message that emerges, and that is that the European Union is a decidedly more attractive place to start a business than to the UK.” The CMA's decision for Smith marks "arguably the darkest day of Microsoft's forty years in the country", and "substantially undermines our confidence in the future as regards the possibility of developing a technology business in England."

And if Smith 's words have appeared boulders to a political class navigating the perilous and unexplored waters of Brexit, the silences of the CEO of the Redmond house, Satya Nadella , are even more frightening. When asked what would happen if the acquisition were to be finalized, in the face of the block imposed by the Cma Microsoft will stop selling Activision games in the UK, Nadella did not deny, limiting himself to saying : "Let's wait for everything to be concluded", A Microsoft -exit in full force that British politics will certainly do everything to avert it.

This is a machine translation from Italian language of a post published on Start Magazine at the URL https://www.startmag.it/innovazione/dopo-lo-stop-della-cma-alla-acquisizione-di-activision-luk-teme-una-microsoft-exit/ on Thu, 18 May 2023 13:44:22 +0000.