Sega Says ‘No Thanks’ To Potential Microsoft Acquisition
In the last few years, Microsoft has maintained an excellent rapport with veteran video game developer and publisher Sega, with some of the most prominent fruits of their relationship being the many Sega games released on theXbox Game Passservice, some even at launch. With the companies working so well together, it’s fair to wonder if they’d ever make their relationship more official. Unfortunately for Microsoft, Sega would prefer just to be friends.
This week, Sega’s parent company, Sega Sammy Holdings Inc., was briefly mentioned in the ongoing lawsuit between Microsoft and theFederal Trade Commission. According to documents that appeared in this lawsuit, Microsoft had apparently been considering making a formal offer to Sega Sammy to fully acquire Sega in the interest of securing more big releases for Game Pass. When asked byBloombergif Sega would ever go for this deal, Sega co-Chief Operating Officer Shuji Utsumi merely said, “No, not now.”
Sega and Microsoft are just friends
“We are very close with Microsoft and have a great relationship with its management team,” Utsumi told Bloomberg. “Microsoft particularly has a high regard for us. Xbox’s Phil Spencer and Sarah Bond are really serious about values that video game fans emphasize.”
However, Microsoft isn’t the only company Sega deals with. Sega has maintained longtime relationships with the other power players of the gaming industry, Nintendo and Sony. Considering Microsoft’s current legal woes revolve around their acquisition of Activision Blizzard and the other major publishers' concerns with that, an acquisition of a big brand like Sega may be met with similar resistance.
PlayStation, in particular, has said that Microsoft’s Game Pass approach harms the industry, which could hamper any potential Sega merger. “I talked to all publishers, and they unanimously do not like Game Pass because it’s value destructive,” PlayStation boss Jim Ryan recently toldThe Verge. “I talk to publishers all the time, and this is a very commonly held view over many years by the publishers.”
