Microsoft has backtracked on some of the wording in its recent response to the United States government’s Federal Trade Commission (hereon referred to as the FTC).
In December, Microsoft claimed the FTC’s lawsuit against its Activision Blizzard buyout was unconstitutional, and specifically violated the Fifth Amendment.
However, the company has now gone back on this argument, admitting it “should have dropped these defences before we filed”.
“The FTC has an important mission to protect competition and consumers, and we quickly updated our response to omit language suggesting otherwise based on the constitution,” Microsoft public affairs spokesperson David Cuddy said in a statement to Axios.
“We initially put all potential arguments on the table internally and should have dropped these defences before we filed.”
Cuddy closed by acknowledging Microsoft has “appreciated feedback about these defences” and stated the company is now “engaging directly with those who expressed concerns to make [its] position clear.”
Microsoft has now issued a new filing which omits the insinuation that the FTC lawsuit violates the United States Constitution.
It does, naturally, still insist that should its ongoing efforts to purchase Activision Blizzard be successful, this buyout would not unfairly suppress its games industry competition.
Meanwhile, earlier this week, FTC lawyer James Weingarten stated the agency is not currently engaged in “substantive discussions” with Microsoft regarding its lawsuit.
