FTC sues to block Microsoft's Activision Blizzard merger

The Federal Trade Commission has filed an antitrust lawsuit in a bid to block Microsoft's planned $68.7 billion takeover of Activision Blizzard. The FTC started looking into the deal and its potential impact on the video game market soon after it was announced in January. Evidently, the agency was concerned enough to pump the brakes on the buyout. The FTC said that, were the deal to go through, it "would enable Microsoft to suppress competitors to its Xbox gaming consoles and its rapidly growing subscription content and cloud-gaming business." The FTC's commissioners voted in favor of the lawsuit along party lines, with the three Democratic members approving it.