Microsoft has reiterated that it would make no business sense to remove Call of Duty from PlayStation consoles if it succeeds in acquiring Activision Blizzard.
In a statement to The Verge, Microsoft corporate vice president and deputy general counsel Rima Alaily said there is “absolutely no financial incentive” for Microsoft to remove the Call of Duty series from PlayStation. “Which is why we have repeatedly said we won’t,” Alaily said.
Microsoft intends to “bring more games to more people, not less,” Alaily added.
Microsoft released this statement in response to the UK’s Competition and Market Authority’s recent calculations that asserted Microsoft could make money by taking Call of Duty off PlayStation. Microsoft said the CMA’s math is bad, wrong, and unfair, saying it “massively skews the results.”
“Unfortunately, there are clear errors in the figures being used to value the small number of Sony customers who might move to Xbox in the absence of Call of Duty,” Alaily said.
Any “realistic model” would show that it makes no financial sense to take Call of Duty off PlayStation, the executive said.
Microsoft has been saying this for a long time now. In September 2022, Microsoft said it “makes zero business sense” to take Call of Duty off PlayStation.
After Microsoft bought ZeniMax and Bethesda, it announced that its upcoming games The Elder Scrolls VI and Starfield would be exclusive to Xbox on console. Bethesda’s latest games were released across multiple platforms, and Sony believes this shows Microsoft has a history of taking games away from PlayStation. Microsoft does not see it this way and contends that every console-maker has its own exclusives.
