On January 18, Microsoft announced that it would acquire Activision Blizzard, a publisher of game development and interactive entertainment content, at a price of $95 per share. The total value of the all cash transaction was $68.7 billion, setting a record in the field.
From the acquisition of Pico by byte jump to the renaming of Facebook meta, since 2021, the spark of metauniverse has become a prairie fire. Many Internet giants are actively laying out games or devices to seize the metauniverse market.
On January 19, affected by the above news, A-share cloud games, metauniverse, Nef and other concepts rose strongly.
Take the game as the entrance
On January 18, Microsoft announced that it would acquire Activision Blizzard at a price of $95 per share and a total cash transaction value of $68.7 billion, setting a record transaction amount in this field.
It is reported that the acquisition is expected to be completed in fiscal year 2023. After the acquisition, Microsoft will have 30 internal game development studios and become the world’s third highest revenue game company after Tencent and Sony.
Meanwhile, winning the world’s top Activision Blizzard will help Microsoft better compete with meta in the meta universe era. Compared with the deep foundation of competitor meta in the social field, it is not easy for Microsoft to enter the meta universe at the to C end. The game has become the only way for Microsoft to enter the to C end and build the meta universe.
Microsoft said that 3 billion people around the world play games every day. Especially driven by the new generation of immersive interactive entertainment, games have become the largest and fastest-growing form of entertainment in the world. This acquisition will accelerate the growth of Microsoft’s game business in the fields of mobile, PC, host and cloud, which will lay the foundation for the meta universe.
Blizzard Entertainment is a world-famous game production and distribution company. In terms of technical reserves, according to the latest data of smart bud, Blizzard and its affiliates have more than 1100 patent applications in 126 countries / regions around the world, mainly focusing on activation publishing and king com. Two affiliated companies. Among them, invention patents account for nearly 90%, and more than 720 invention patents have been authorized.
Through the analysis of all the above patents, it can be seen that Blizzard’s current patent layout mainly focuses on the technical fields related to video games, virtual world, interactive, virtual reality and so on.
Satya NADELLA, chairman and CEO of Microsoft, once said that games are the most dynamic and exciting entertainment category among all platforms today, and will play a key role in the development of metauniverse platform. The company is deeply investing in world-class content, community and cloud to create a new game era, put players and creators first, and make the game safe, inclusive and open to everyone.
further analysis from the meta universe field shows that among the patent reserves owned by Blizzard, there are more than 560 patent applications applicable to the meta universe technology field, all of which are invention patents, of which more than 420 have been authorized. Blizzard’s patent layout in the meta universe field is basically consistent with the company’s overall patent layout, focusing on video games, virtual world, etc.
Relevant researchers of wisdom bud said that metauniverse is a comprehensive technical field, and video games are one of the main core technologies. Since the technology corresponding to the patent does not necessarily correspond to its actual application scenario one by one, Blizzard’s metauniverse patent reserve mainly refers to the overall situation of the company’s patents applicable to the metauniverse field.
Giants accelerate the “arms race”
In fact, over the past few years, Microsoft has become more active in games. In 2014, Microsoft acquired game developer mojang.com for us $2.5 billion In 2020, Microsoft also completed the $7.5 billion acquisition of game developer Bethesda.
In August 2021, byte beat acquired Pico, the leading manufacturer in China’s VR industry, at a sky high price, which officially ignited the enthusiasm of A-Shares for metauniverse. In January 2022, byte jump once again laid out a new action of yuanuniverse track. Hangzhou liweike Technology Co., Ltd. announced that it was invested by byte jump’s affiliated company Beijing quantum jump Technology Co., Ltd., which holds 20%. The new round of financing will be used for product R & D and continuous incubation of IP. It is reported that Li Weike is laying out the XR track and plans to launch mass-produced XR glasses this year.
Relying on its inherent advantages in the social and game fields, Tencent mostly expands the meta universe by means of “social + game”. According to incomplete statistics, Tencent has invested directly or indirectly in 67 game companies as of October 2021, covering mobile games, end games, VR games, content, platform construction and technology development.
Based on diversified products and user needs, Netease continues to pay attention to R & D investment. After long-term technology accumulation, Netease has made layout in meta universe related fields such as VR, AR, artificial intelligence, engine, cloud game and blockchain.
The acquisition of game companies has also increased recently, except that Microsoft announced the acquisition of Activision Blizzard yesterday. Last week, take two, a rival of Activision Blizzard, said it would buy Zynga, a game development company, with $11 billion in cash and stock, becoming one of the largest industry acquisitions in history at that time.
Anxin Securities said in the rotation sequence of the six territories of the yuan universe that hardware and content come first, and the content is mainly games. On the one hand, games are not only a subdivision of the content industry, but also the epitome of economy, art, community and governance in metaverse’s new universe. On the other hand, considering the multi-dimensional factors such as technical maturity, user matching and content adaptability, the game is also an excellent way to explore the meta universe. The virtual world built by the game may be the first exploration to the meta universe.
Who benefits most from the cloud game industry chain?
By the good news of Microsoft’s acquisition, Activision Blizzard rose 37% before trading yesterday, and its closing price was US $82.31, up 25.88%.
Microsoft’s acquisition of the game company undoubtedly played a role as a wind vane.
On January 19, the concept of A-share cloud game strengthened in early trading, Sichuan Xun You Network Technology Co.Ltd(300467) (300467. SZ) rose by 20%, Hubei Century Network Technology Inc(300494) (300494. SZ), Rastar Group(300043) (300043. SZ) rose by more than 12%, and Wuhu 37 Interactive Entertainment Network Technology Group Co.Ltd(002555) (002555. SZ), Shenzhen Bingchuan Network Co.Ltd(300533) (300533. SZ), Ourpalm Co.Ltd(300315) (300315. SZ) all rose sharply. Game ETF (516010) rose by more than 4%, with a turnover of more than 27 million yuan.
As of January 18, funds continued to overweight the game sector, and the game ETF (159869) had a net inflow for five consecutive days, with a total amount of more than 100 million yuan.
Market participants believe that, at this stage, the game is generally considered by the industry to be the field most likely to take the lead in realizing the “meta universe”, because it naturally has a virtual field and a virtual avatar of players.
The fundamentals of game stocks themselves are also improving. According to the report on China’s game industry in 2021, the actual sales revenue of China’s game market in 2021 was nearly 300 billion yuan, a year-on-year increase of more than 6%. The overseas market still performed well, with an actual sales revenue of nearly US $18 billion, a year-on-year increase of more than 16%. Galaxy Securities said that in the long run, the game industry still has good growth.
In the cloud game industry, there is also a long industrial chain.
According to the Sealand Securities Co.Ltd(000750) Research Report, the industrial chain of cloud Games includes cloud game developers and publishers, cloud computing providers, cloud game service providers, network providers, terminal equipment providers, etc. The upstream includes game developers (providing content resources and strong development capability), cloud computing manufacturers (having IDC resources and providing computing capability support), software and hardware manufacturers (providing cloud CPU / GPU hardware and software supporting solutions); Midstream is a cloud game operator or system equipment provider; Downstream are terminal integration manufacturers, including manufacturers of mobile phones, PCs, Ott boxes and game consoles.
The 21st Century Capital Research Institute believes that the first benefit will be content and hardware equipment. Among them, the hardware is mainly consumer level and industry-level VR terminals, and the content mainly includes games, video, live broadcast, etc.
Game content providers related to A-Shares include Wuxi Boton Technology Co.Ltd(300031) (300031), Perfect World Co.Ltd(002624) (002624), G-Bits Network Technology(Xiamen)Co.Ltd(603444) (603444), Hangzhou Electronic Soul Network Technology Co.Ltd(603258) (603258), etc. In terms of hardware, VR head display equipment is an important output port. A-share companies with relevant layout include Goertek Inc(002241) (002241), Suzhou Anjie Technology Co.Ltd(002635) (002635), Luxshare Precision Industry Co.Ltd(002475) (002475), Kingnet Network Co.Ltd(002517) (002517), Union Optech Co.Ltd(300691) (300691), etc.
However, it still needs to be pointed out that the game industry still has a long way to go before it really enters the meta universe.
From the perspective of the previous meta universe game – horizon worlds public beta experience and the virtual city “xirang” created by Baidu, players generally believe that this meta universe is still very rough. There was user feedback, and many people reported that vertigo occurred after wearing VR for a long time. In addition, users also use Tucao not only the character is not smooth, but also often make complaints about bug.
Many insiders also pointed out that there are still many basic problems to be solved in the development of meta universe. Shi Yuzhu, chairman of Giant Network Group Co.Ltd(002558) (002558. SZ), also said that hardware problems such as VR vertigo, network delay, economic system compliance based on blockchain, cloud computing power, etc. should be solved.
Guo Jianjun, CEO of Weiling times, a cloud game solution company, once told 21st Century Capital Research Institute, “Cloud games are very complex. We need to adapt different chips from the chip driver level. Devices are so-called hardware servers and heterogeneous servers. We need to ensure stability through a long time and strong technology. In addition, cloud computing will put forward high requirements for the construction capacity of GPU, and we also need to invest a lot of construction and research in the computing pool Research and development. “
