Microsofthas signed another 10-year agreement in its ongoing bid to expand its slate of Xbox PC games to more platforms. The announcement follows similar deals that were made recently whereMicrosoft signed a 10-year agreement with Nvidiaalong with Nintendo as a means of pushing its pending $68.7 billion Activision Blizzard acquisition. Its latest agreement marks the tech giant’s third deal to go public within a span of a month.
Over the past few months, Microsoft has been making an active effort in trying to convince regulators to give its Activision deal the green light. But concerns from the likes of the FTC and the CMA have only been compounded with growing opposition from Microsoft’s competitor, Sony. The company has been open about where it stands on the Activision purchase, even going so far as to claim thatMicrosoft could downgradeCall of Duty’s quality on PlayStation consolesif the deal goes through. Amid this situation, Microsoft has resorted to forming long-term partnerships with other industry players in hopes of pushing the Activision deal amid the vocal opposition.
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According to the company’s announcement,Microsofthas signed a 10-year deal with Ukraine-based cloud gaming platform Boosteroid. The agreement will bring Xbox PC games as well as Activision Blizzard titles like Call of Duty to the platform, which hosts over four million users worldwide. While Microsoft hasn’t offered specifics, the deal will likely play out similarly to Nvidia’s, where players can stream games bought on the Windows Store and third-party titles with streaming rights to Boosteroid. Following the announcement, Boosteroid CEO states that the partnership is a result of his company sharing “Microsoft’s vision of bringing games to as many people, places, and platforms as possible” and it fulfills the goal of enabling gamers to experience “their favorite titles on any device close at hand.”
The 10-year agreement also marks Microsoft’s latest effort in supporting Ukraine amid the ongoing Russian war. As per the company’s President Brad Smith, this partnership “builds on the $430 million in technology and financial assistance” that Microsoft offered since the Russian invasion. The tech giant has actively provided support to the war-torn country in numerous forms over the past year, including organizing anXbox andFortnitecharity drive that raised $144 million.
Regardless of the company’s ongoing support for Ukraine and its growing footprint in gaming, Microsoft will likely continue to face vocal opposition from both Sony and the regulators. Of course, Microsoft claims that it attempted to sign a similar 10-yearCall of Dutydeal with Sony, but the company said it refused such an arrangement. The biggest complaint from the PlayStation maker is that it believes aCall of Dutydeal will only hurt the industryand that it will “irreparably harm competition.” Either way, this situation will continue to take the spotlight with Microsoft possibly looking to sign more deals similar to that of Boosteroid in the coming months.
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