The European Commission has opened an in-depth investigation to assess the proposed acquisition of Activision Blizzard by Microsoft under the EU Merger Regulation. The Commission is concerned that the proposed acquisition may reduce competition in the markets for the distribution of console and PC video games and for PC operating systems. The deal is already […]

A report on the video games sector from investment bank Berenberg says that q-o-q that there has been some improvements in sales and revenues but that the “market remains soft”. “While global video game sales declined slightly y-o-y in Q3 2022, sales grew q-o-q, helping stem the double-digit declines seen earlier in 2022. PC and […]

Microsoft’s purchase of Activision Blizzard could substantially lessen competition in consoles, multi-game subscription services and game streaming, a UK watchdog has warned. Microsoft had aimed to buy the maker of Overwatch, Candy Crush and Call of Duty for $68.7 billion. But now the UK’s Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) says its concerns mean it may […]

A report from Seeking Alpha’s Jason Aycock, based on an examination of major interested parties by market research company NPD Group including Microsoft, Sony, Activision and others, suggests that as the Covid lockdown periods ended – or softened – then sales of video games also suffered. February 2022’s sales numbers fell again, for the fourth […]

All eyes were on Sony and Microsoft who released their 9th generation consoles, the PlayStation 5 and Xbox Series X/S, in autumn 2020. A year and a half later, Dataxis has offered its assessment. The pandemic and subsequent lockdowns was an incredibly successful period for video game console manufacturers: sales of hardware and software (Animal […]

Sony Interactive Entertainment has announced that it will buy video game developer Bungie in a deal worth $3.6 billion (€3.2bn). Bungie is best known for creating the Destiny and Halo video game franchises – with Halo, significantly, being one of the key titles that has contributed to the popularity of Microsoft’s Xbox consoles. The deal […]

Microsoft Corp has confirmed it will buy Call of Duty videogame maker, Activision Blizzard, for $68.7 billion (€60.4bn) in cash, making the Xbox manufacturer the third-largest gaming company by revenue. Microsoft’s offer is a premium of 45 per cent to Activision share price last week. Shares of Activision were up nearly 38 per cent at […]

Analysis from investment bank Berenberg says that video games’ share of consumer entertainment time and budget continues to grow. Duel console ownership, frequency of digital content purchases and time spent playing games are all up compared to 2020 and meaningfully above 2019. The analysis suggests that Netflix’s ambitions in the sector will, in the short […]