Microsoft Celebrates As Xbox Vs. FTC Officially Comes To An End

We never thought we’d see the day, but it’s finally happened! Fresh off a recent blow in the fight against the Xbox Activision Blizzard takeover, the FTC has announced today that it’s dropping its case against Microsoft.

In a filing, the FTC said that “the public interest is best served by dismissing the administrative litigation in this case”, and therefore the complaint over the Activision Blizzard acquisition has been officially dismissed by the court.

Microsoft president Brad Smith then took to social media to celebrate the news as a “victory for players”:

Earlier this month, the FTC was informed by the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals that the Commission hadn’t been able to convince that Xbox’s takeover of Activision Blizzard would “substantially lessen competition in the relevant markets”.

It was believed that another appeal could have followed that decision, but the most likely outcome was that the FTC was going to drop the case – and that’s indeed what’s happened today.

If you need a refresher of everything that happened with the FTC, we’ll drop a few related stories below!