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Xbox’s expansion into the mobile market is something Phil Spencer has commented on countless times since the Activision Blizzard purchase was announced. Despite Sony’s insistence that the acquisition only targets Call of Duty, the Redmond offices have always wanted to highlight the relevance of this deal for Xbox’s growth within the mobile market. Something that has become clear again in the last interview they have conducted with the CEO of Xbox.
As we have been able to learn through a Resetera thread, Microsoft is preparing to launch a new application store for games on iPhone and Android devices for next year. However, the expansion of Xbox to the mobile market has a really important condition, as is that the competition regulatory bodies definitively approve the acquisition of Activision Blizzard.
The expansion of Xbox to the mobile market is conditioned by the purchase of Activision Blizzard
It should be remembered that there are now new laws on the board, which force both Google and Apple to accept the existence of alternative stores to those that they have in their operating systems, something that will foreseeably come into force as of March 2024, according to a European provision. Given this, Spencer shared again a few words about the purchase of Activision Blizzard, and how important it is for them that this ends up being certified.
We want to be able to deliver Xbox and content, both from us and from third parties, on any screen someone wants to play on. We can’t do it on mobile today, but we want to build towards a world that we think will come where those devices will be open.
In this regard, it should be noted that Microsoft and Apple have already had several confrontations with the mobile market as the protagonist. The reason is that, in order to play cloud gaming on Xbox, Apple device users need to do it through the web browser, due to Apple’s App Store policies, which requires that all games that are playable on their devices are published individually in their store, something impossible to achieve for the game in the cloud.
New date for the final decision of the European Commission regarding the purchase of Activision Blizzard
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This type of decision has caused organizations such as the European Video Games Federation to demand that the duopoly that currently exists with two of the most important companies on the planet end. There is no doubt that Microsoft will be an important rival to beat against Google and Apple, but for this we will first have to see the green light in the Activision Blizzard operation.