Bobby Kotick alleges a lawsuit against Microsoft’s Activision acquisition was secretly aimed at helping Embracer Group
Embracer Group says it’s “humbled” by the accusation but denies it
UPDATE 20/01/26:
This article was updated to include details on the CRD settlement, in which it found allegations against Activision and Bobby Kotick to be unsubstantiated.
Former Activision CEO Bobby Kotick has alleged that an ongoing lawsuit objecting to Microsoft’s acquisition of Activision Blizzard was secretly designed to help rival publisher Embracer Group.
As reported by Game File, the lawsuit was filed in 2022 by a Swedish pension fund, Sjunde AP-Fonden, also known as AP7, which alleged that Kotick rushed the sale of Activision Blizzard to Microsoft following allegations that executives intentionally ignored or attempted to downplay reported instances of sexual harassment and gender discrimination.
Both Kotick and Activision have denied the allegations and, in 2022, the California Civil Rights Department found such allegations to be unsubstantiated.
In a recently filed ‘answer’ to the AP7 lawsuit, Kotick and his lawyers not only denied the claim but also filed a counterclaim, alleging that AP7 had ulterior motives in filing the suit, including “to exert collateral harm on Activision” and to help Embracer.
“This Delaware lawsuit was apparently aimed to help pave the way for Embracer to increase its foothold in the California market at the expense of Activision, making it more difficult for Activision to recruit talent and expand through [merges and acquisitions] activity of the sort that Activision relied on to grow historically,” Kotick and his legal team claimed.
Kotick claims that because AP7’s view chairman Emma Ihre was an executive at Embracer at the time of the lawsuit’s filing, he believes the lawsuit was filed to mount a “collateral attack on Activision [that] also appears to be tied to Embracer’s desire to boost sales of its games while leaving Activision hamstrung in the development of its own games that competed against Embracer’s titles”.
In a statement to Game File, Embracer has denied Kotick’s allegations, saying it didn’t have to rely on a lawsuit to compete with Activision.
“We are humbled of Mr Kotick’s remark that we were competing with Activision on this level,” an Embracer Group representative told the publication. “Nevertheless, perhaps difficult to accept for Mr Kotick, but we did not and do not need any help from a Swedish pension fund in competing with Activision.
“Thus, in short, there were no coordination or collaboration between Embracer and AP7 relating to any of Mr. Kotick’s statements. No agenda or instructions were directed from Embracer via Emma Ihre or directly to AP7.”
