Microsoft’s $7.5 billion deal to acquire Bethesda Softworks’ parent company, ZeniMax Media, has been cleared by both US and EU regulators. The approval of the potentially game-changing agreement was confirmed by the European Commission and U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission, which shared documents and statements on their websites supporting their conclusions. Both bodies determined that Microsoft’s acquisition of ZeniMax Media would not raise any competition concerns.
“The European Commission has approved, under the EU Merger Regulation, the acquisition of ZeniMax Media Inc. by Microsoft Corporation, both of the U.S. ZeniMax is a company that develops and publishes games for personal computers (‘PCs’), gaming consoles, and mobile devices,” a statement published by the European Commission reads. “Microsoft is a global technology company, which develops, publishes, and distributes games for PCs, consoles, and mobile devices.”
“The Commission concluded that the proposed acquisition would raise no competition concerns, given the combined entity’s limited market position upstream and the presence of strong downstream competitors in the distribution of video games. The transaction was examined under the normal merger review procedure. More information is available on the Commission’s competition website, in the public case register under the case number M.10001.”
Now that the deal has been approved, ZeniMax Media and Bethesda Softworks’ legendary game studios are just a few steps away from officially joining Microsoft’s growing family of first-party Xbox developers. They include Bethesda Game Studios, id Software, ZeniMax Online Studios, Arkane, MachineGames, Tango Gameworks, Alpha Dog, and Roundhouse Studios.