The UK’s Competition and Markets Authority has now extended the inquiry period of Xbox Activision deal.
The CMA has now delayed its plans to publish its final report on Microsoft’s proposed acquisition of Activision Blizzard by up to eight weeks. Instead of March 1, 2023, it is now April 26, 2023. They did say that they will aim to complete the inquiry as soon as possible and in advance of this date.
Way back in September 2022, the CMA revealed that its investigation into the big merger got expanded to a second inquiry phase. They had numerous antitrust concerns in regard to this big deal.
Just like the FTC, the CMA was worried that this acquisition would impact the competitor’s ability to compete. Since the deal will include the Call of Duty franchise, which is a big game, the competition would lose a lot of benefits.
Inquiry Group Chair Martin Coleman revealed the reason for the delay of CMA’s final report. He says that there are some special reasons why the report cannot be prepared and published within the original reference period.