Sony’s current deal with Activision Blizzard is expiring next year, according to Microsoft president, Brad Smith.
In an interview with CNBC on Feb. 21 regarding the recent deals of Microsoft with Nvidia and Nintendo, the Sony situation was brought up. Brad Smith reiterated that the company still has hopes that it’ll reach an agreement with Sony and that it will be great for consumers around the world. He also said that the current deal the company is proposing to Sony would be an even better deal than the one it has right now.
The current agreement between Activision Blizzard and Sony includes a clause that prohibits it from being included in Xbox Game Pass for “a number of years.” It wasn’t indicated just how many years, but since Activision Blizzard is being acquired by Microsoft and the deal is about to expire next year, Microsoft is offering Sony the same agreement it gave Nintendo. This is a commitment to ensure Sony receives Call of Duty games for the next 10 years.
It seems, however, that Sony is still thinking about this deal as the current one allows Sony to have console-exclusive content. PlayStation players have early access to Modern Warfare 2’s beta, Combat packs, and even an exclusive operator the players can only get if they play the game on PlayStation.
In November 2022, Paul Tassi, a contributor to Forbes, said he thinks the main reason Sony isn’t accepting the deal is that it knows Microsoft wouldn’t take the game off of Sony’s shelves as this will be a bad publicity stunt and would backfire on Microsoft’s reputation.
Accepting the new deal that Microsoft is offering could tip the scales over in Microsoft’s favor. It would give mixed signals to regulators into thinking that maybe it’d be fine for Microsoft to acquire Activision Blizzard. As of now, there are still no responses from Sony.
