European Commission Merger Control Approves:

The European Union (EU) has approved Microsoft's $68.7 billion acquisition of Activision Blizzard, after the tech giant offered a 10-year licensing deal to competitors for cloud gaming. The EU found that Microsoft would have no incentive to refuse distribution of Activision's games to Sony, and even if it did withdraw the games from PlayStation, it would not significantly harm competition in the consoles market. However, regulators found the acquisition could harm competition around the distribution of PC and console games through cloud gaming services. To address this, Microsoft has offered free licenses to consumers and cloud providers in the EU. The company is still appealing the decision of UK regulators who blocked the deal last month. The deal is also facing regulatory scrutiny in the US and from other countries.