Phil Spencer in 2020 Discussed Microsoft Acquiring Nintendo and Valve - News
by William D'Angelo , posted on 19 September 2023 / 4,299 Views
Microsoft Gaming CEO Phil Spencer in an email responding to Microsoft executive vice president and chief commercial officer Takeshi Numoto discussed the possibility of acquiring Nintendo, as well as Valve and Warner Bros. Interactive. The email and other documents were left unredacted in a newly published FTC document.
"Takeshi, I totally agree that Nintendo is THE prime asset for us in gaming, and today gaming is our most likely path to consumer relevance," reads the email from Spencer. "I’ve had numerous conversations with the LT of Nintendo about tighter collaboration and feel like if any US company would have a chance with Nintendo we are probably in the best position.
"The unfortunate (or fortunate for Nintendo) situation is that Nintendo is sitting on a big pile of cash, they have a BOD [Board of Directors] that until recently has not pushed for further increases in market growth or stock appreciation. I say 'until recently' as our former MS BoD member ValueAct has been heavily acquiring shares of Nintendo and I've kept in touch with Mason Morfit as he's been acquiring. It's likely he will be pushing for more Nintendo stock which could create opportunities for us.
"Without that catalyst I don't see an angle to a near term mutually agreeable merger of Nintendo and MS and I don't think a hostile action would be a good move so we are playing the long game. But our BoD has seen the full writeup on Nintendo (and Valve) and they are fully supportive on either if opportunity arises as am I."
Spencer added at the time they had two main acquisitions they were looking into, which were Warner Bros. Interactive and Bethesda Softworks parent company ZeniMax Media. Microsoft would end up acquiring ZeniMax in September 2020.
"I won't say WB or Zeni is Nintendo but both are for sale and gettable by us if things align," said Spencer. "Biggest obstacle in WB is IP ownership, we wouldn't own any of the IP which hurts long term flexibility and the only obstacle on Zeni is valuation expectations of founders. But I think it's likely one or both of these happen which will help us continue to double down on our gaming relevance."
Spencer concluded, "At some point, getting Nintendo would be a career moment and I honestly believe a good move for both companies. It’s just taking a long time for Nintendo to see that their future exists off of their own hardware. A long time."
It should be noted this isn't the first time Microsoft had considered acquiring Nintendo as Nintendo had reportedly "laughed their asses off" when Microsoft approached them for a possible buyout over 20 years ago.
A life-long and avid gamer, William D'Angelo was first introduced to VGChartz in 2007. After years of supporting the site, he was brought on in 2010 as a junior analyst, working his way up to lead analyst in 2012 and taking over the hardware estimates in 2017. He has expanded his involvement in the gaming community by producing content on his own YouTube channel and Twitch channel. You can contact the author on Twitter @TrunksWD.
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I think it's really speaking that Phil Spencer's career moment wouldn't be that his studios create one of the best game of all time, or that one of the Xbox console becomes one of the best selling console ever, but rather spending yet another dozens of billions to buy Nintendo
Again, Microsoft has done a song and dance and people act like they can't see. This isn't a maybe or a joke. Microsoft WILL merger with Nintendo and they already started the process. They are using VauleAct to buy shares of Nintendo and have been doing so for some time now.
Microsoft discussed absorbing Zenimax in 2020 and did.
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Its the first time a monopoly has been encouraged by a subset of toxic consumers and has been allowed. Microsoft wanted the video game market to have control over something in the consumer sector and so they set out to do that playing the long game as they said.
ValueAct has only a very small number of Nintendo shares. That would also be a hostile takeover, which is literally impossible to do with Nintendo. That's not how this works. Nintendo could just issue more shares if someone came even close to 50% and a hostile takeover would be blocked by the government. Companies of that size and cultural significance are protected in Japan. And that's without mentioning actual regulators. This would be a horizontal merger, which is way harder to get through than a vertical one like AB even if Nintendo approved themselves. They haven't started shit. Nintendo would need to agree in any scenario, which they won't.
This speaks volumes about MS/XB culture. They are focused about "owning the best", and not "creating the best"
If you own the best and they create the best, you still made the best. Sony also bought most of their studio's. Though Sony studios mostly grew under Sony to become the best. Microsoft lately rather buys studios already at the top. Only Nintendo build most of their studios really from the ground up to the absolute best.
"Though Sony studios mostly grew under Sony to become the best."
That makes all the difference!
If I buy a piece of land, some small seedlings and with them I make one of the largest farms in the world, I am a "creator".
If I simply buy what is already complete and successful, I am a "buyer".
Playstation is predominantly a creator.
XBOX is predominantly a buyer.
Still if ES6 will be the best RPG of all time, all credits and money go to Microsoft. Same would be the case for Starfield.
You would be forgetting studios like Turn10 and Playground which also grew under Xbox. Same goes for the Coalition and 343. PlayStation isn't the only one who grew their own studio's. Though they definitely have more to show for it as of now. PlayStation also bought Bungie which was already at the top of their game. So whilst Microsoft definitely tends more to buying the best to create their best atm, it's not like their creative branch is dead.
I'm not forgetting...That's why i said, "predominantly" and not "exclusively".
Of all +20 Sony studios/IPs, you pointed only Bungie as Buy and not creating.
On the other hand, of all Xbox 30+ Studios, you only talk about 4 Studios, 1 of them working on acquired IP ( GEARS), as Created and not a Buy.
Sony, 1 Buy out of +20 .
MS, 4 created out of +30.
My point stays.
out of 22 studios Sony created 7 and acquired 15, 10 of those being acquired in the last 5 years and created 0 (Team Asobi was only a rebranded existing team out of closed-down studios).
Out of 23 studios MS created 6 and acquired 17, 15 in the last 5 years, and 2 created.
I'm not seeing how both are so apart only MS has been more active over the last 5 years than SONY on both fronts.
I already made my point with the seedling and land analogy. If you can't accept It, and have a different view, that's on you Randy.
This analogy does not work though, it puts too much emphasis on time.
By the same definition, you could say Sony was mainly an acquirer who has grown to be a creator with time.
and MS is mainly an acquirer who will grow to be a creator with time.
MS bought Mojang/Minecraft in 2014 a product that everyone thought was already way over its prime, Yet MS grew it's users from ~30m to ~200+m, released countless updates, and grew the studios from sub 100 employees to 700+ employees.
By your very definition, this makes MS the creator of Mojang and Minecraft as we know it today not the acquirer.
So your definition delimits the difference between the 2 as only dependent on the time they had with studios after their acquisition. This conveniently placed MS, the one most active recently as the bad "acquirer", and Sony the one whose acquisition is less active today as to good "creator". Yet they are the same, just conveniently looked at through the window of time which makes them appear different.
But hey, If you can't accept It, and have a different view, that's on you Manly.
They do both. They just don't shy away from acquisition when someone does best them. It's not like it's devoid of logic either. MS pumps north of $20B/year in R&D, many times more than those "innovative" companies they acquired ever have in their lifetime. But the thing is for 1 successful innovation in a field 100s others will miss. And while MS does Innovate in many fields, what innovation will catch on and what others will miss is more luck-based than anything else.
It's ludicrous to believe they'll succeed in all their attempts even more so to try to paint their miss as them not attempting at all. This is more akin to painting the situation as you would want MS to be perceived rather than as MS is.
The usual from MS, really. Their statement about how it's too early to join the VR industry and how it needs to be 10 times bigger, Satya's statement about how "you can't wake up one day and build a gaming studio", transitioning to ARM after the entire industry has made contribution to the space except for them, could you be any lazier?
They have the money to be complacent and them complain that the market leaders don't want them to buy everything.
MS will not rest until they own the entire industry. Only ones they can't outspend are Saudi Arabia. Well Nintendo would laugh them out of the room again.
Yikes
Microsoft is by far the worst Big 3
Amazing that when it’s an acquisition of Nintendo, everybody understands the problem of mergers. Activision? Nobody cares.
Well, Nintendo and Activision are very different companies. An acquisition of Nintendo would affect the gaming industry, and the gaming hobby, much differently than an acquisition of Activision. So, it is reasonable, in fact logical, for a gamer to view them differently.
I was also not happy about Activision merge either, but the impact of a eventual Nintendo acquisition would be far deeper because Nintendo is a hardware maker
How can you even compare Nintendo to Activision??.
Better question: how are they different? I’m not asking about how the companies are different, I’m asking how the mergers would really justify such drastically different responses from ppl.
As far as I can see, both instances involve a juggernaut cannibalizing another juggernaut. Yes one company makes better games, yes one is a console manufacturer, and yes one has a significantly better record on workers rights…but what I’m having trouble understanding is whether ppl actually care about any of these things? Like what difference does it make to ppl if Nintendo is sold under Microsoft? All it reads to me is a more explicit display of predatory business behavior: at the end of the day, both are extremely problematic moves in the industry.
From the same email, Phill: “Gaming is our most likely path to consumer relevance”, well it certainly isn't the NEW Bing, aka the borrowed ChatGPT, that now has LESS market share than the old Bing had, funny :)
MS can't let ABK go because the TikToc generation don't use their products and find it more natural to get computing done on Android/iOS than they do on Windows. This is a fight for relevancy (because it certainly isn't innovation that will win MS consumers back).
"We can't make good games consistently, let's just buy a major company who can and lock them to our ecosystem"
I want what Phil was having when he wrote that email lol. Sony has as much of a chance to buy Nintendo or Valve as Microsoft would. NONE!
Japan would literally become the representative of Nintendo on the global scale lmao. They would hold out until the very end.
Sony isn't American company though.
Might want to tell them that these days....
Even if they somehow came close to buying Nintendo, the hate they would recieve from many gamers would be enough to make them back off I think.
You seem to be forgetting that businesses do massively unpopular moves all the time…and get away with it. Netflix with their family plan thing is a good example of this.
It should be noted those talks were about expressing interest and did not go anywhere.
The two that did get into advanced negotiations were WB games and Zenimax, and they ultimately went with Zenimax
Didnt liked the guy, and i was right, this is disgusting and the way he talks in the emails is disgusting, media keeps giving this dyde awards and interviews to let him lie and act superior , to me he is at the same level if not worst than some of the worst gaming ceo 's , at the same level than unity ceo.
No way in hell they will ever have Nintendo after ABK deal.
I doubt they’d have got Nintendo even if they hadn’t gone for ABK.
Yes certainly it would be of Nintendo best interest to be bought by MS.... and yes he isn't looking to take away from others...
What gets taken away if MS buys Nintendo?
I don't agree with MS buying Nintendo, but curious on your post
Always like these statements, it shows how much of a different ballpark MS really do play in.
Don't worry guys, Microsoft trying to buy the whole gaming industry is just healthy competition, it's good for the players, right?
The level arrogance is insane. He actually thought he knew better what's good for Nintendo than they themselves.
Management at xbox 's game divisionm is terrible. They honestly need to focus on the internal development. Phil needs to spend less time aquiring and getting his teams below him in check.
phil said they are playing the long run with nintendo... they arent over yet.
Surely and attempt by Microsoft to acquire Nintendo or Valve would be DoA due to the near certainty that bodies like FTC and CMA would block them as anti-competitive.
Ok, maybe their would be a case that the Valve acquisition would be fine, but unlike the Activision one I can’t see a way it be said that MS getting Nintendo wouldn’t weaken competition in the industry.
This was from 2020. This was a few years before Bethesda was acquired even.
This wouldn't work anyways.
