Bobby Kotick’s Activision Blizzard Among Top Future Players

The metaverse is shaping up to be a significant moneymaker for the gaming industry. Here’s how Activision CEO Bobby Kotick positions his video game company for survival and success. Bobby Kotick’s Activision-

Activision CEO Bobby Kotick has set his sights on the metaverse. “I am certain that our incredible talent and extraordinary games combined with Activision Blizzard’s shared commitment to the very best workplace will enable us to grow in an increasingly more competitive race for leadership as gaming through the metaverse evolves,” he said.

In January 2022, Microsoft announced it intended to acquire Bobby Kotick’s Activision Blizzard through a $68.7 billion all-cash deal. “I am incredibly proud of this company and the work we have done together,” Kotick told employees in an email confirming Microsoft’s intention to take over the video game company he’s been leading since 1991. Its stable of games includes Call of Duty, Skylanders, Crash Bandicoot, World of Warcraft, Tony Hawk Pro Skater, Sekiro, Diablo, Hearthstone, Candy Crush Saga, and Overwatch.

During that time, he caught the attention of other business leaders. American billionaire Charlie Munger once said Kotick “is one of the smartest business executives I know.” And now, as he helps lead the company into this next chapter, Kotick says the transaction represents “endless possibility for us. I could not be more appreciative of [all of the employees’] focus and dedication to connecting the world through joy and fun.”

What Is the Metaverse?

Think of the metaverse as a way to blur the social barriers between digital and physical worlds via virtual reality (VR), augmented reality (AR), and mixed-reality devices and services. It became a big buzzword in 2021 after Facebook rebranded itself as Meta Platforms. The name change and launch of its Oculus VR headsets, games, and equipment, developed by its Reality Labs branch, confirmed the company’s future focus on the metaverse market.

Some aspects of the metaverse have existed in games created by Bobby Kotick’s Activision Blizzard for years. Of course, we’re talking about World of Warcraft; however, Microsoft’s Minecraft and Epic Games’ Fortnite are also early entries into the metaverse. Microsoft’s CEO Satya Nadella said gaming “will play a key role in the development of metaverse platforms” without mentioning which franchises Microsoft planned to evolve into those virtual worlds.

Epic Games CEO Tim Sweeney believes Fortnite has the potential to be way more than a game and says the metaverse is a multitrillion-dollar industry. “The metaverse is a term like the internet. No company can own it,” says Sweeney.

The next few years will be critical for all metaverse-aspiring companies like Facebook, Epic, Roblox Corporation, Microsoft, and Activision Blizzard. “It is kind of a race to a billion users,” stated Sweeney. “Whoever brings on a billion users first would be the presumed leader in setting the standards.”

Sweeney also said, “I do believe in this future of the world in which billions of people are wearing AR hardware, AR glasses are their everyday life, and I believe that is the entertainment platform of the future. And we’re going to be there.”

Bobby Kotick seems confident that Activision Blizzard has a place in the metaverse. “For the last 30 [plus] years, we have continuously shaped gaming through our commitment to deliver fun, joy, and the thrill of accomplishment,” he said. “We have transformed games into social experiences, and our games have helped discover purpose through entertainment. By doing so, we have created and entertained communities of hundreds of millions of players.”

Activision CEO Bobby Kotick Discusses Connecting All of the Gaming

According to Kotick, the next step is bringing together the gaming communities, such as Tencent, Facebook, NetEase, Apple, Sony, Amazon, and Microsoft. “They have ambitions for their own gaming and metaverse initiatives,” he said, explaining that these “established and emerging competitors see opportunities for virtual worlds filled with professionally produced content, user-generated content, and rich social connections.”

With or without the Microsoft merger, Kotick seems confident that the talent at Activision Blizzard will continue to make games that will eventually thrive in the metaverse. “We have always attracted the very best game makers and built the best games, seizing the opportunity with passion, inspiration, determination, and focus,” he said.