Activision Blizzard is owned by Microsoft (the United States, NASDAQ: MSFT), which acquired the brand on 13 October 2023 for $68.7 billion.[1][2] Activision Blizzard was founded in 1979 in Santa Monica, California and was independent until 2023.
Evidence: Microsoft Corporation Annual Report on Form 10-K filed 2026-07-29, SEC EDGAR, 29 July 2026. Verified from filings; last checked .
Activision Blizzard makes Call of Duty, World of Warcraft and, through King, Candy Crush. Microsoft acquired it in 2023 for $68.7 billion after a contested review in which British and American regulators both initially sought to block the deal.
Sentences about Activision Blizzard from Microsoft's latest annual filing[1], copied word for word.
NOTE 7 BUSINESS COMBINATIONS Activision Blizzard, Inc. On October 13, 2023 , we completed our acquisition of Activision Blizzard, Inc. ("Activision Blizzard") for a total purchase price of $ 75.4 billion, consisting primarily of cash.
Activision Blizzard is a leader in game development and an interactive entertainment content publisher.
The financial results of Activision Blizzard have been included in our consolidated financial statements since the date of the acquisition.
A plain count of the times the name appears in the text of each annual report, not counting the start of a sentence. A brand that an owner writes about more is usually one it treats as central. The brand is named less often than it was three years earlier.
Controlling ownership as of . Brands grouped under the entity that owns them; large groups are collapsed.
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See the full Microsoft brand portfolio (15) →
Microsoft controls 15 brands on Brandtree, 7 of them in internet & digital.
The 22 brands in games & gaming platforms on Brandtree belong to 15 owners. The largest is DoubleDown Interactive, with 5; Microsoft has 3.
| Brand | Owner | Owner based in |
|---|---|---|
| Duelz | DoubleDown Interactive | 🇰🇷 South Korea |
| Supersonic from Unity | Unity | 🇺🇸 United States |
| Epic Games Store | Epic Games | 🇺🇸 United States |
| Hago | JOYY | 🇸🇬 Singapore |
| GameMaker | Kunlun Tech | 🇨🇳 China |
| Nintendo Switch | Nintendo | 🇯🇵 Japan |
| Roblox | Roblox | 🇺🇸 United States |
| Garena | Sea | 🇸🇬 Singapore |
Microsoft is a publicly listed company headquartered in Redmond, Washington, United States, founded in 1975. Brandtree records 15 brands under its control, and it is listed as NASDAQ: MSFT.
Microsoft was founded in 1975 writing a BASIC interpreter for an early hobbyist computer and became dominant by licensing an operating system to every PC maker rather than building the machines. It has since bought several of the largest consumer internet properties, including the biggest acquisition in the history of video games.
Brandtree records a controlling owner for 2,549 brands that began in the United States. 478 of them (19%) are now controlled by a company headquartered in another country; Activision Blizzard is not one of them.
Microsoft acquired Activision Blizzard for $95 per share in cash, about $68.7 billion, the largest acquisition ever made in the video games industry. It closed twenty-one months after announcement following contested reviews in the United States, the United Kingdom and the European Union.
The Competition and Markets Authority blocked Microsoft's acquisition of Activision Blizzard in April 2023, finding it would harm competition in cloud gaming. It was the only major regulator to prohibit the deal outright, and the decision was widely reported as putting the transaction in doubt worldwide. The case was closed in August 2023 once the parties restructured.
The Federal Trade Commission challenged the acquisition in its own administrative court and separately sought a preliminary injunction in federal court to stop it closing. The injunction was denied in July 2023 and the deal completed, while the administrative proceeding remained on foot. It is a clear example of three regulators reaching three different answers on one transaction.
After the original transaction was prohibited, Microsoft restructured it to exclude the cloud streaming rights, selling them to Ubisoft. The Competition and Markets Authority reviewed the restructured deal as a separate inquiry and cleared it on 6 October 2023, allowing the acquisition to complete a week later.
The parent company of Activision Blizzard is Microsoft, a publicly listed company headquartered in the United States.
Yes. Activision Blizzard originated in the United States in 1979 and its owner, Microsoft, is also headquartered in the United States.
Microsoft completed its acquisition of Activision Blizzard on 13 October 2023, after announcing the deal on 18 January 2022. The deal was valued at $68.7 billion (enterprise value).
Activision Blizzard was an independent company from its founding in 1979 in Santa Monica, California until Microsoft acquired it in 2023.
Yes. As of 10 October 2026, Activision Blizzard is still owned by Microsoft. The ownership record was last checked against primary sources on that date.
Last verified . Every ownership fact above is backed by one of these primary documents. Numbers in brackets in the text refer to this list.
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