Epic v. Google: everything we learned in Fortnite court
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Google is explaining that it didn’t spend $360M, let alone billions, just to avoid the risk of ABK building its own Android app store. “At its core, this deal is about a large cloud” partnership, read part of the “Strategic Rationale” email from Don Harrison. He now says Google wanted Activision Blizzard to spend big on Google Cloud and put its games on its (now-shuttered) Stadia cloud gaming service as well.
Here’s “What Google gets” from the deal, according to an internal Google doc:
-Continued Play partnership for ABK titles at current rev share: Standard Hug developer obligations (sim-ship, title parity, quality)
-$200M cloud committment over 3-4 years (TK has approved)
-Increased UAC ads spend, plus $115M/yr DVIP
-Exclusive ESports distribution license for YouTube
-Commitment to partner on Stadia (deal terms TBD)
Here’s what Activision got:
GCP credits equal to 2% of play consumer spend (no cap)
UAC matching credits: $1 UAC ads credit for every $3 ABK spends in UAC ($35M/year cap)
co-marketing funds: $1 in co-marketing funding for every $3 of ABK marketing spend ($20M/year cap)
Esports licensing: $45M for exclusive Esports distribution license for YouTube
Correction: I missed copying over a line about GCP credits. It’s in there now.
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