ATVI Activision Blizzard Inc

By Adria Calatayud

Shares in Ubisoft Entertainment jumped Tuesday after the French videogames company secured cloud-streaming rights to games including the "Call of Duty" series as part of Activision Blizzard's restructured takeover by Microsoft.

At 0756 GMT, shares in Ubisoft rose 6.6% to EUR31.23.

The maker of the "Assassin's Creed" videogame series said it will get cloud rights in perpetuity for Activision Blizzard's existing catalog--including the "Call of Duty" franchise--and new titles released over the next 15 years. Nonexclusive rights to stream in the European Economic Area are excluded from the deal, Ubisoft said.

The arrangement will become effective once Microsoft's acquisition of Activision is completed, Ubisoft said.

News of the deal came as the U.K.'s Competition and Markets Authority said Microsoft had submitted a revised proposal to take over Activision that leaves out cloud rights to its games outside of the European Economic Area after the original $75 billion deal reached in January last year was blocked.

Ubisoft didn't disclose terms of the deal, but the CMA said the French company will make a one-off payment to Microsoft and establish a market-based wholesale pricing mechanism as a compensation for the cloud streaming rights to Activision's games.

The deal will boost the content offering of Ubisoft's subscription service Ubisoft+ and allow it to license streaming access to Activision's games to cloud gaming companies, service providers, and console makers, the company said.

"This will help expand access for players across all streaming services," Ubisoft said.

The CMA said the transaction allows Ubisoft to commercialize the rights to any other cloud gaming-services provider including Microsoft itself.

Write to Adria Calatayud at adria.calatayud@dowjones.com

(END) Dow Jones Newswires

August 22, 2023 04:21 ET (08:21 GMT)

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