Cover news reporter Zhu Ning
Microsoft corporation issued a statement on January 18 that it will acquire Activision Blizzard in full cash for $95 per share, including Activision Blizzard's net cash, with a transaction valued at $68.7 billion, and the acquisition will be completed in fiscal year 2023.
According to the revealed, the deal may be announced as soon as Tuesday local time. A person familiar with the matter said the deal would value Activision Blizzard to $70 billion.
Microsoft will be the third largest gaming company
Microsoft said that after the transaction is completed, Microsoft will become the third-highest-grossing gaming company in the world, after Tencent and Sony.
Planned acquisitions include activision Blizzard and subsidiary King's well-known titles such as the Warcraft series, Diablo, Overwatch, Call of Duty and Candy Crush Saga.
The acquisition means that Microsoft will not only gain access to the other side's current nearly 400 million monthly active users, but also gain access to many popular games.
At the close of trading on Tuesday, Activision Blizzard shares soared 25.88% to $82.31, up more than 32% during the session. Microsoft shares closed down 2.43 percent at $302.65 on Tuesday.
The acquisition is at a premium of about 45 percent and an equity value of about $74 billion. After the transaction is completed, Microsoft will become the world's third-largest game company in terms of revenue, after Tencent and Sony. It is also the largest acquisition in the technology industry, breaking the record of Dell's acquisition of EMC five years ago.
Microsoft forms the game industry chain Sony stock price plunged 13%
Microsoft's entry into the game industry means that the industry competition may be further intensified, and it may be Microsoft's old rival Sony that has been hit the most. After the news of the acquisition, Sony Group's decline in the Tokyo stock market widened to 13% on Wednesday, the biggest decline since September 2014.
For Microsoft, after the merger into Activision Blizzard, Microsoft will have a global lineup of 32 game studios, especially King, a mobile game subsidiary of Activision Blizzard, which gives Microsoft the opportunity to enter the mobile game market that has been snooping for a long time.
Compared with major technology giants such as Google and Apple, Microsoft's gaming business is huge, including the sale of Xbox console hardware and game software, as well as cloud gaming and membership subscription services.
In the third quarter of last year, Microsoft Gaming revenue was nearly $3.6 billion, up 16% year-over-year, and hardware sales increased the most, up 166%, mainly due to continued consumer demand for Xbox consoles. Microsoft's acquisition of Activision Blizzard has also allowed Microsoft to form a strong industry chain advantage in the field of game production and distribution.
With the acquisition of Activision Blizzard, Microsoft is expected to far surpass Sony in terms of game content production capabilities, thereby increasing revenue by selling more games.
Analysts pointed out that the future host war is only Sony and Nintendo, a pair of young plum bamboo horse CP who love each other, Microsoft's battlefield is one level higher, and its competitors are Google, Amazon, Apple, Meta, which are IT giants whose comprehensive strength is enough to call the wind and rain.
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