I see what the latest outrage around this deal is:
I’m not sure what people thought was going to happen when all these cloud players work on a play the games you own model?
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Microsoft has no choice but to fight the decision, if this is allowed to stay as is regulators will be able to do what they want using “possible outcomes” with inaccurate numbers instead of realities, I wouldn’t be against them just dropping it as long as they go and acquire CDPR, Capcom and Asobo in one sweep but who’s to say the CMA won’t use the same cloud argument for that as well? Remember that they know they can stall these deals even if they know their decision can be overturned, which is what will likely to happen here, like the FTC they can do this just to get companies to drop deals, Hoeg also thinks this deal just has a 5% chance of happening now.
And who benefits the most…? Sony, not sus at all, man I would love if they would just drop the UK altogether from their cloud plans just to see what would happen.
And I wonder what would happen if Microsoft just decided to leave the UK, how would this affect Microsoft’s yearly revenue? Because if it wasn’t a big deal (unlikely) they probably should and just blame their regulatory system and quit that market 
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Exactly. Asus, or whoever manufactured the hardware in myPC doesn’t get a revenue split for the games I play on it. They aren’t a storefront, they’re hardware. Hardware doesn’t get revenue in this industry, storefronts do. Where it gets kind of blurry is that some cloud providers are hardware only (GeForce Now) and some are hardware/storefronts (Stadia/xCloud).
If someone thinks that’s a gotcha they aren’t very smart.
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Well they would own the product. Its only fair . Lets not forget Nvidia, Boosteroid and the other 2 knew this and signed anyway. They understand the deal is good for them.
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The absolutely baffling obstructionism by UK to protect Sony & Google might cost the UK economy billions if not tens of billions pear year. Both directly by Microsoft scaling down their operations in that country and indirectly by the PR war that might ensue in the coming years.
I wonder what engaging with Microsoft means, maybe ministerial overrule is possible in the end?
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Sunak is a very weak prime minister who didn’t even win a general election. He was appointed by the party.
It means a lot of decisions in that country can also be politically motivated in the sense the government won’t want to look ‘weak’ with big tech. It’s unfortunate but a lot of reactions we’re seeing in the UK are positive towards the CMA’s obstructionism against the ‘big bad American company’.
I expect zero sense or justice to come from those people in 10 Downing Street.
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Because its a moronic take from a bunch of idiots? Lets not forget the CMA dismissed Nintendo and Steam as part of the gaming market, claimed CoD was a required input, Sonys 68% market share must be protected (but Microsoft 60-70% of streaming must be stopped at all costs) and fucked up their numbers each time.
They are either corrupt or a bunch of idiots.
Granted the EU is still pending, but if that goes through, theres no reason a small island would reasonably have this take when every other country in the world does not.
It doesnt matter. If GPU = Xcloud then Amazon Prime = Luna. There are 200m + AP subscriptions and less than 20 million GPU subscriptions.
Microsoft isnt the market leader in streaming based in the CMAs own definitions. The CMA has lied. They did it before when arguing console market shares and they are doing it now. Again.
Do we really want regulators who lie and omit by any means to block innovation?
According to the CMA, Microsoft will 100% have the monopoly in streaming with or without ABK. Apparently its inevitable. If thats a commonly held take after the EU rules, fair play.
If not, thats an irrational conclusion built on faulty (and when i say faulty, i really mean fabricated by the CMA) numbers.
I mean what are the odds that the only regulator in the world with the power to stop this deal with no real appeals process is the one who:
- Doesn’t believe Nintendo is part of gaming
- Or Steam
- Or CoD is a required input.
- Disregards legally binding deals
- Doesn’t find evidence to be reliable if it contradicts their agenda
- That a company with a 68% of 100% Market share should be protected
- But the company with an alledged 60-70 share of 1% is dangerous
At this point we should drop all pretenses. The CMA never wanted this deal to happen from the outset. They are like a child who invents new rules when they lose board games.
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In terms of company size, is Microsoft the biggest one yet to appeal? 2 trillion dollar will do such thing.
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Microsoft are offering to let cloud companies to play the ABK games that they’ve bought so all the revenue would either go to steam or Microsoft through the battle.net store. I don’t understand why anyone think it would be different? It’s not like they are suddenly going to offer those games on every store or game subscription because they couldn’t guarantee how those deals would work
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Yeah, this new slant people are taking is people trying to stir the pot. The cloud deals seem to be all about getting access to stream game on their platform. If they were purchasing the game through cloud storefront then of course they would get the 70% cut, but it seems Microsoft is just giving them the permission to stream their games and not the ability to sell games.
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These cloud providers wouldn’t be signing deals if it had bad terms… using the CMA/competitors logic just having Call of Duty on their service is VITAL, I know If I was running one of these services and a title was VITAL to my platform to grow I wouldn’t mind giving up on sales/mtx cuts.
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Exactly those who use the service will pay the subscription and if this Cloud providers want the 30%, they can create their own storefronts to sell said games heck they could even work with each other to allow the games to be playable from each other’s storefronts. The CMA made no sense in that, and I wonder if Microsoft can show the inconsistencies here which to me constitute to lying or deception of the public.
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I didn’t read the 400+ page document the CMA published but from the multiple things posted online, the CMA have so many misconceptions about cloud gaming and the models used it’s crazy. Added to which much of the basis for the rejection seem to have come from the two main complainants who have misconstrued the facts to suit their opposition to the acquisition and the CMA have taken it at face value
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I think you are missing the fact that for nascent markets the CMA have the ability to make forecasts based on uncertain or even no data and predict risk likelihood. They themselves admit that its just a case of determining if something is possible or not.
It boils down to this - whether MS could prove there is zero percent risk of them monopolising the cloud gaming market in the future and additionally that there is a zero percent risk that the ABK acquisition will give them more chance to do that.
That is the CMA’s remit and framework that has existed since 2019 - its not something that’s new.
The problem then is that there isn’t a way MS could guarantee that wouldn’t happen (because its impossible) and there is no way of showing the ABK IP’s wouldn’t accelerate or help that in a hypothetical future. Because that is the standard the CMA set. Not for this acquisition but in general.
I don’t think they have some mad political reason to block this one specifically - they are measured on a KPI of protecting consumer future markets and in this instance for example they applied their framework to the merger identified a risk (it doesn’t matter if the risk is 1% or 99%) and then looked at what remedies could remove that risk. The conclusion (and I think they are correct) is that only removal of the most significant IP from the deal removes the risk.
The problem you and I and everyone else has is that they have taken a very low risk and blocked the deal based on it. That doesn’t make sense. But it is what they have been given a remit to do and exactly how they set themselves up to deal with these deals.
So I go back to the fact that nothing special or magical has been done because its MS. The problem isn’t the CMA or how they’ve analysed this deal. Its the fact that they’ve been given a remit and instruction to protect markets and cut out the risk. If that’s what you are being measured on - you take no chances.
Just another term for inventing scenarios to block the deal.
I think it boils down to Microsoft appealing the case that the CMA is a bunch of morons who have left a paper trail of mistakes and bad math.
Its pretty clear that being in line with their remit and framework doesnt mean much if they’re going to fabricate whatever circumstance they want to block any deal for any reason.
Their standard has persistantly changed since the start. One mistake might have been understandable. Multiple mistakes is a pattern. There isn’t a point in appealing to the CMAs standards to be re-examined. They are decisions they reached by manipulating data, their whole stance on cloud is flawed.
Alternatively their console market concerns fell apart when the math was pointed out as incorrect and they dropped it and built their reasoning about cloud because it was all they had.
In the very least any tribunal would agree (and this is why the CMA should be expunged or at least given a proper appeal by court) that they did the math wrong and many of their points such as CoD being a required input and Microsoft being contractually obligated to provide it to any cloud platform that wants it pokes holes.
CoD can’t be a required input for consoles and cloud and simultaneously denounced as unbeneficial to this deal proceeding by guarenteeing it.
The CMA is contradicting itself. Which is something they wouldnt do if they acted rationally. It is something they would do to block the deal no matter what.
Its all well and good pointing out the CMA have always acted this way and nothing new. Thats why it needs to change.
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Yes. Anyone surprised by this truly don’t know the industry at all. That is exactly how GeForce Now operates. They make their money on the subscription cost, not through sales of software.
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If the people who work for the CMA could really accurately predict future trends & markets, they’d be working for Microsoft or Apple on a 7 figure salary. It’s typical governmental mumbo-jumbo to portray their own branches as having the sort of foresight which the top paid private sector investors could only dream of having.
So let’s be real here, i.e. there’s a trend against big tech in America & Britain with regulators now working to block at all costs (on ideological grounds as far as Lina Khan is concerned). Microsoft was simply unfortunate to be ‘first served’ with the regulatory crackdown shitcake.
10 years ago this deal passes easy peasy lemon squeezy, no questions asked.
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The problem is two fold. First the CMA have stated themselves to block a deal such as this based on a nascent market and projections into the future the result has to be the more likely outcome. Do they believe that a combined ABK+Microsoft are more likely to dominate the market to such an extent that others wouldn’t be able to compete when they themselves have said it wouldn’t happen in the console market?
And secondly they are subject to the whims of the CMA on market definitions. Cloud gaming is simply another access point to the same games that can be played locally on console, pc or portable.
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I think on one what they say is that the merger would be blocked IF it made it the more likely outcome. And I think it does. It’s not a question of how likely…just does owning ABK IPs make it more likely that MS in the future could monopolise the market….and I think everyone has to say ‘yes’ to that. Does it make it likely or not is not the question they ask.
The second part is true but MS themselves have spent ages, talking about the cloud and indeed at the start of this process talked about cloud gaming as a significant imperative to it. All regulators seem to have reached a conclusion that a cloud gaming market exists to one extent or another it’s now just a question of how they deal with the threat to that. The CMA have been instructed to take a hard line. The EU have the same conclusions but more leeway to allow behavioural remedies.
Ultimately I think what people are missing is that the fault lies not with the CMA but with the remit government has given them.
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