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Blizzard-Activision Merger Official
The Washington Post's Mike Musgrove is reporting that the Blizzard-Activision merger is official as of yesterday afternoon. "One analyst has predicted that the merged company would make $1.38 billion in profits during its first financial year, enough to make Activision Blizzard the world's largest game publisher. [...] But this merger should give the newly-formed company enough heft to compete with EA for such blockbuster projects, said Pachter. 'It's good to have a duopoly instead of a monopoly,' he said. 'This just makes the industry that much more interesting.'"
I doubt the merger would have been agreed upon without this sort of stipulation, in either case.
Depends on who's in the position of strength. Pixar has been producing hit after hit, charging popular culture with its own imagery. Of course, the Disney emblem gets stamped on top of that because Disney distributes. But the underlying role is all Pixar - a role that Disney had in previous decades. Meanwhile, Disney produced an occasional boxoffice hit and a slew of related direct-to-DVD rehashes to throughly milk those few successes. They also produce disposable pop icons. And occasionally fall back on their historical success by the false-scarcity tactic of re-releasing old classics from their "vault".... for a limited time, of course.
It hasn't been working out well for Disney. I couldn't say its all about their box office. But I know folks who work for the Mouse and I'm hearing tales of decline at Disney's flagship parks (even beyond Disney's customary employee burn-out rate). Disney is stumbling.
It seems to me that Disney needed Pixar a lot more than Pixar needed Disney. Granted - Pixar gets things out of that deal. And I wouldn't be surprised if a bigger piece of the Disney kingdom was a part of that deal.