Activision与Blizzard将合并
Activision and Blizzard Merge to Create Activision Blizzard!
A big shake up in the world of the video game Publishers has occured this afternoon. Activision famous for its Guitar Hero, Tony Hawk and Call of Duty franchises and Blizzard Entertainment known for its 9 million subscriber MMORPG World of Warcraft have announced that they will merge to create Activision Blizzard the “world’s largest, most profitable pure-play video game publisher“. Move aside Electronic Arts.
UK corporation the BBC were the first to reveal the news earlier today. As a result of the merger, Activision and Blizzard will henceforth be called Activision Blizzard, a deal which is worth $18.8 billion.
The deal will work by Blizzard investing $2 billion into Activision Blizzard and Activision will invest a lowly $1 billion. The CEO of the new company will be the current CEO of Avtivision, Bobby Kotick. However French mega company Vivendi Universal the owner of Blizzard will remain the biggest shareholder in the company, retaining 52% of all the shares.
Jean-Bernard Levy, CEO of Vivendi, said, “This alliance is a major strategic step for Vivendi and is another illustration of our drive to extend our presence in the entertainment sector. By combining Vivendi’s games business with Activision, we are creating a worldwide leader in a high-growth industry.”
Mike Morhaime, CEO and president of Blizzard, said, “From our interactions with the Activision team, it is clear we have much in common in terms of our approaches to game development and publishing. Above all, we are looking forward to continue creating great games for Blizzard gamers around the world, and we believe this new partnership will help us to do that even better than before.”
Both Activision and Blizzard have issued press releases filled with jargon and technical stuff confirming the merger but at least we know its for real. I don't know if I like this or not but either way a new super power in the video game industry has been born. I guess time will tell if this is a good thing or bad thing… Let war commence.
近日，全球游戏界出了一件大事，2家游戏业的大公司合并，成立了一家新的公司。2家合并的公司其中一方，就是暴雪的母公司--维旺迪游戏部门（Vivendi Games），而另外一家，则是很多人都熟悉的游戏《使命召唤》的发行公司--Activision。
不过，这次的合并不会给暴雪带来什么改变，暴雪仍将作为独立的开发公司存在，并不会出现合作开发之类的事情。Mike Morhaime将继续担任暴雪娱乐的主席和首席执行官。
Activision，发行著名《使命召唤》和《吉他英雄》的全美第一第三方发行商，和维旺迪游戏部门（Vivendi Games），包括曾制作《星际争霸》、《魔兽世界》等著名游戏的子公司暴雪娱乐（Blizzard Entertainment），在昨日宣布正式合并，并将成为“全球最大，盈利最高的游戏发行商”，重改名为Activision Blizzard。
根据报导，本次合并中实际上是维旺迪作为主方，所以虽然新公司名上有暴雪的字样，但是合并方依然为Activision和Vivendi Games。维旺迪将拥有Activision Blizzard的52%股份，而Activision现任首席行政官Bobby Kotick将出任新公司的CEO职位。
维旺迪CEO Jean-Bernard Lévy对本次合并非常兴奋，表示“（Activision Blizzard）在未来数年将成为带领全球互动娱乐事业的积极、向上的公司。我们很期待成为这样一个新公司的大股东。”消息惊人啊
