Neowin

The tentative date for the official appeal hearing was set by the UK's Competition Appeal Tribunal by the judge, the Honourable Mr. Justice Marcus Smith, during a case management conference today.

The Korea Fair Trade Commission has approved Microsoft's plan to acquire Activision Blizzard with no conditions, due in part that the game publisher's titles are not very popular in the country.

Microsoft has several specific points it will raise to the CMA's Competition Appeal Tribunal to show why its decision to block its purchase of Activision Blizzard should be overturned.

In a speech today in Brussels, Belgium, Margrethe Vestager, the EVP for the European Commission, offered its reasons why it approved of Microsoft's acquisition of Activision Blizzard.

The appeal was made to the CMA's Competition Appeal Tribunal by Microsoft, but it's currently unknown how long the group will take to make a decision on whether or not to overturn the ruling.

Microsoft Activision deal recently faced blowback from the UK regulator who rejected the deal. While the UK is not happy with the deal, a report suggests that the EU will approve the deal soon.

After Microsoft's £55 billion takeover of Activision Blizzard was blocked in the UK, the company brought in top legal talent to take the fight to the UK's CMA in a Competition Appeal Tribunal.

Welcome back to another edition of Microsoft Weekly where we recap all the important events that happened in the Redmond technology giant's universe in the past few days. Dive right in!

Ukraine's Antimonopoly Committee has given its approval for Microsoft to purchase Activision Blizzard for $69 billion, even as the UK's regulatory authority rejected the deal earlier this week.

Microsoft is continuing to expand its cloud gaming partnerships despite CMA's recent decision. The company is entering another 10-year deal, this time with European game streaming provider Nware.

In an interview with the BBC, Microsoft President Brad Smith said this week's decision to block its Activision Blizzard purchase makes the EU "a more attractive place to start a business" than the UK.

While Microsoft's stock price seems to be unaffected by today's news of the UK's rejection of its purchase of Activision Blizzard, the game publisher is suffering from a major stock downturn.

Microsoft President Brad Smith said that the company remains "fully committed to our acquisition" of Activision Blizzard and said it was "especially disappointed" with today's CMA decision.

The UK Competition and Markets Authority has decided that Microsoft's deal to buy Activision Blizzard "would damage competition in the Cloud Gaming market" and has rejected the $69 billion acquisition

A new report claims that if the UK and EU regulators approve Microsoft acquiring Activision Blizzard, the company could close the deal soon afterwards, and take the chances with the UK FTC's lawsuit.

The latest edition of Microsoft Weekly contains all you would need to know about the latest events that transpired in the world of Microsoft during the past week, dive right in without further ado!

Blizzard is kicking off one final Diablo IV playtest as the highly anticipated action RPG's June release date draws near. A full weekend of dungeon diving will soon be available with a special reward.

Activision and Infinity Ward have kicked off another free event for the latest Call of Duty entry, Modern Warfare II. A large portion of the multiplayer is available to play for free for a week.

South Africa's Competition Commission says the deal for Microsoft to acquire Activision Blizzard would not cause "a substantial prevention or lessening of competition" in the game industry.

This week's Microsoft Weekly digest is chock-full of news items related to controversies related to AI-powered products, the arrival of free USBs for Windows Insiders, and multiple app updates.

Sony says that the UK CMA regulator has understated how much money Microsoft could make if Call of Duty was made into an Xbox-exclusive title under a merger with Activision Blizzard.

The latest edition of Microsoft Weekly packs news items related to "Windows 12" leaks, some hidden capabilities in Windows 11, and a bunch of app updates, with a sprinkle of Windows 7 news.

Activision Blizzard CEO Bobby Kotick published an email sent to the company's employees about its plans to be bought by Microsoft, and slammed Sony for its attempts to block the merger.

Japan has become the latest country to approve Microsoft's acquisition of Activision Blizzard for a whopping $68.7 billion. It seems like the tides are finally turning in Microsoft's favor.

An official Microsoft statement says the company has actually "expanded footprint" of games that it has shipped on PlayStation consoles following its acquisition of ZeniMax in 2021.

The latest edition of Microsoft Weekly is filled to the brim with news about updates to Microsoft 365 apps and services like Teams and Edge, new features and bugs in Windows, and Copilot upgrades.

The UK Competition & Markets Authority's provisional conclusion says Microsoft's acquisition of Activision Blizzard "will not result in a substantial lessening of competition" for UK console gaming.

The move to delay the decision is likely to give Microsoft more time to offer concessions to the European Commission so it will finally approve the $69 billion acquisition of Activision Blizzard.

The US Federal Trade Commission says Microsoft has only sent it "a smattering" of requested files pertaining to its proposed Activision Blizzard purchase, and has not produced anything for 24 requests

Microsoft has signed its third 10-year Call of Duty distribution deal with a partner, this time Boosteroid. It had previously signed similar agreements with Nintendo and Nvidia already.

Join us in the latest edition of Microsoft Weekly where we recap important news updates from the Microsoft-verse including a new Canary Channel, AI shenanigans, and updates to Microsoft services.

Sony told the UK's Competition and Markets Authority that Microsoft could put in "bugs and errors" on a PlayStation version of Call of Duty if it completes a merger with Activision Blizzard.

More Call of Duty games that skipped out on Steam releases have finally launched on the popular PC storefront, ditching their Battle.net exclusivity. Only Call of Duty: Black Ops 4 is missing now.

The latest edition of Microsoft Weekly is filled to the brim with news about the latest major update to Windows 11, "Moment 2", a reference to Windows 12, and updates to services like Windows 365.

A new report says that the EU's European Commission is going to let Microsoft complete its $69 billion purchase of Activision Blizzard without Microsoft selling any of its assets and game properties.

Early access to the Diablo IV open beta will let gamers access three of the game's player classes, while the full Open Beta will add two more classes. It'll also support online and couch co-op modes.

This week's edition of Microsoft Weekly contains interesting news items about ads for Edge, current and upcoming Windows development, and bugs in Microsoft's OS. Find out more in our latest digest!

Activision's next Call of Duty title is reportedly set in the Modern Warfare universe while still acting as a standalone title so that it can be marketed as a full-price release this year.

Microsoft announced a deal with NVIDIA that will add the company's Xbox PC games to the GeForce Now cloud gaming service. Activision Blizzard games will be added if the Microsoft merger goes ahead.