Here are the next important dates:
- January 3rd 2023: Prehearing conference with the FTC Administrative Law Judge. It's virtual and public.
- Early January 2023: Provisional findings and remedies (if required) from the CMA. My guess would be between January 3rd and 17th.
- January 18th 2023: Original outside date (when the parties expected the merger to be done). If MS quits before that date they have to pay a termination fee of $2,000,000,000; if they don’t, the outside date gets extended until April 18th 2023.
- Late January 2023: Statement of objections from the EC (unless MS can offer a convincing remedy package to avoid it).
- February 3rd 2023: Decision from New Zealand.
- March 1st 2023: Final report and remedies (if required) from the CMA.
- April 11th 2023: Final decision from the EC (if MS didn’t close the deal in before in Europe).
- April 18th 2023: Second extension of the original outside date. If MS quits before that date they have to pay a termination fee of $2,500,000,000; if they don’t, the outside date gets extended until July 18th 2023.
- April - May 2023: Decision from the SAMR in China.
- July 18th 2023: The end of the second extension and final outside date in the merger agreement. If MS quits before that date they have to pay a termination fee of $3,000,000,000; if they don’t, they’ll have to renegotiate the outside date with ABK.
- August 2nd 2023: Beginning of the FTC in-house trial.
- Early 2024: Decision from the FTC administrative law judge.
- Anything beyond that: Unknown
If everything goes super well for MS in 2023 (approvals by the CMA, EC and SAMR + a positive ruling from the Supreme Court in the Axon case), and the FTC doesn't want to settle with a consent decree, I think that at least there is one more year ahead :s
The FTC in-house trial is in August 2023, but a ruling will take 7-10 months. And even if that's positive for MS, then it goes back to the Commission. So, add 6-9 extra months before MS can go to federal court (add 6-9 extra months for that process alone).
The administrative process is a dead end for MS, the FTC knows it and uses it in that way. MS now has to play ball with the FTC because there is no other way, but they know perfectly well that they need a shortcut to bypass-it one way or another.
