The United Kingdom Competition and Markets Authority (UK-CMA) on Wednesday blocked the proposed $68.7 billion merger of Microsoft and Activision-Blizzard. In its press-releasing announcing its final decision into an investigation on the question of how the merger will affect consumer-choice and innovation in the market, the CMA says that the merger would alter the future of cloud gaming, and lead to "reduced innovation and less choice for United Kingdom gamers over the years to come." Cloud gaming in this context would be games rendered on the cloud, and consumed on the edge by gamers. NVIDIA's GeForce NOW is one such service.

Microsoft Azure is one of the big-three cloud computing providers (besides AWS and Google Cloud), and the CMA fears that Microsoft's acquisition of Activision-Blizzard IP (besides its control over the Xbox and Windows PC ecosystems), would "strengthen that advantage giving it the ability to undermine new and innovative competitors." The CMA report continues: "Cloud gaming needs a free, competitive market to drive innovation and choice. That is best achieved by allowing the current competitive dynamics in cloud gaming to continue to do their job." Microsoft and Activision-Blizzard are unsurprisingly unhappy with the verdict.

Two of NVIDIA's providers of Outsourced Semiconductor Assembly and Test (OSAT) services are of the opinion that Team Green is happy to stay the course with its Ada Lovelace GPU production schedule. The backend providers Siliconware Precision Industries (SPIL) and King Yuan Electronics (KYEC) have not been given any new instructions with regard to shifts (up or down) in component assembly output. It is theorized that NVIDIA is aiming to clear any stock backlogs of graphics card models featuring previous generation architecture - namely the second gen GeForce RTX 30-series, built on Ampere.

The retail demand for the newly released GeForce RTX 4070 cards has been mild, to say the least - with plenty of inventory remaining on the shelves in the States. Critical reception of the midweight GeForce RTX GPU has also been middling - many have advised that budget conscience buyers should potentially look elsewhere. The market for discrete graphics card is in a fairly healthy state at the moment, with major production issues and fractured supply chains becoming lesser concerns for electronics manufacturers. NVIDIA has the advantage of being a market leader, and seems to be quite content with proceedings - but their analysts are very likely keeping an eye on the RTX 4070 sales figures. Its products are out and readily available - no need to change direction too sharply.

Amazon is today expanding its Luna cloud gaming service into three new territories - Canada, Germany and the United Kingdom. This is the first sign of the online retail giant's goal to broaden the service beyond the initial launch base in the USA. The company is clearly excited to offer their cloud games library to a larger customer base: "Gamers in the U.S. have been enjoying Luna for the past year and we're thrilled to expand the service, giving more customers the opportunity to play high-quality, immersive games without expensive gaming hardware or lengthy downloads."

These new territories have been granted access to Luna's full package which now consists of Ubisoft+, Jackbox Games, and Luna+ subscription services. The Luna app can be launched on 'select devices', which means a wide range of modern bits of kit can run it: Fire TV, Fire Tablets, Windows PCs, Chromebooks, Macs, iPhones, iPads, Android phones and tablets. Amazon confirmed that its Official Luna Wireless Controller is also being made available to customers in Canada, Germany and the United Kingdom - which is an exclusive item to the Amazon Store. It should be noted that you can run other compatible control devices via Bluetooth, including a wireless keyboard and mouse, as well as the Xbox One and PlayStation DualShock 4 gamepads.