Activision Blizzard

Blizzard President Mike Ybarra has also decided to leave, and Blizzard’s survival game has been canceled.

Microsoft completed its purchase of video game-maker Activision Blizzard for $69 billion on Friday, closing one of the most expensive tech acquisitions in history that could have repercussions across the video game industry. The notice that the deal has gone through came seven hours after Microsoft got final approval from Britain’s competition watchdog, which reversed its earlier decision to block the merger, removing the last obstacle for the transaction.

Microsoft also said it was negotiating changes to the deal to satisfy objections made by a British regulator, which could allow it to complete its purchase of the video game giant as soon as this month.

The green light follows objections to the blockbuster deal by American and British regulators on the grounds that it would undercut competition.

The all-cash $68.7 billion purchase of the maker of Candy Crush and Call of Duty will turn Microsoft, maker of the Xbox gaming system, into one of the world’s largest video game companies. It will also help it compete with tech rivals such as Meta, formerly Facebook, in creating immersive virtual worlds for both work and play.

Netflix has been sued again for poaching executives, this time by Activision Blizzard, over its hire of CFO Spencer Neumann. In the lawsuit filed on Friday, Activision accuses Netflix of hiring Neumann as its CFO when he was less than two years into his contract. Neumann was hired as CFO by Netflix in January 2019.

Google’s YouTube Gaming unit escalated the talent war being waged among live-streaming powerhouses, announcing a deal with publishing giant Activision-Blizzard to exclusively stream events from three of the world’s most popular esports titles.