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Machiavellian said:
I read the process can take up to years so unless MS really think this thing can land, they probably should just pay that dowery money to ABK and bail. Ether that or they have a plan B that probably requires them to split ABK up. |
MS should definetly act as if the deal dead and yet still procede with every legal avenue they have at their disposal. They have $3B worth of reasons to fight to the bitter end on this.
Also, its true that going by the norm chance are slim with the CMA, but I do believe MS have a stronger case than most prior, so hard to say what are the real probabilities. The scope on which the decision to block was taken appears to be very narrow, any rebutal of CMA evidence/resoning or individual conculsion by the CAT, can make it really difficult for the CMA to reach the same overall conclusion. My understanding is that the CAT can quash CMA decision partialy, so the best case scenario here is for the CAT to quash the cloud SLC and ordering remittal on this allowing the CMA to only adjudicate again on the cloud market then MS can simply leave the UK cloud gaming market cutting the legs of the CMA have to even consider an SLC again.
Anyway the next pieces of information we'll have to weigh in the probabilities are the actual appeal arguments from MS and experts thought on them. Then EC decision, other market decisions and finaly the FTC case results.
