In Microsoft’s biggest acquisition till date, the software giant announced a deal to buy American based video game developers Activison Blizzard for an all-cash transaction valued at $68.7 billion. A blog post released during early Tuesday detailed how the acquisition would allow Microsoft to expand their gaming business and also gain entry into the lucrative metaverse space.
The blog post read “This acquisition will accelerate the growth in Microsoft’s gaming business across mobile, PC, console and cloud and will provide building blocks for the metaverse.”
Microsoft Chief Executive and Chairman Satya Nadella added, “Gaming is the most dynamic and exciting category in entertainment across all platforms today and will play a key role in the development of metaverse platforms”. This deal further backs how the metaverse is evolving into a booming industry, something Nadella discussed in depth last year.
Once the deal is closed, Microsoft would become the third largest gaming corporation – just one position behind rival Sony, which is currently looking to advance its own footprint into the metaverse through PlayStation VR2.
Metaverse continues to dominate in 2022 – becoming increasingly popular as the gaming industry sees high revenues during times of pandemic. Well known corporations such as Epic Games, Tencent and Meta (Facebook) are already ahead of the pack through new metaverse backed games and VR headsets. Even media conglomerate Walt Disney plans to cash in on the hype by launching its own metaverse at its theme parks.
For the moment, Microsoft has not confirmed plans on launching any virtual reality headsets or specific games related to the metaverse such as Facebook’s Horizon Worlds. However, games such as Warcraft, Diablo and Call of Duty do have an immersive environment and it would be interesting to see if Microsoft is able to bring such projects into the virtual space through their own cutting edge technology.