Microsoft May Acquire Discord Next Month

Microsoft’s acquisition spree doesn’t appear to be letting up, though the next one isn’t a game studio. Wall Street Journal reports that the company is in talks with Discord to purchase the company for at least $10 billion, according to “people familiar with the matter.” If negotiations don’t fall through, the deal could be completed as soon as next month.

For those who don’t know, Discord is a voice and text chat application that allows people to communicate with one another. It’s incredibly popular in the gaming community, with people using it to chat with each other without having to use the built-in chat that comes with a game or console. The service also allows people to create their own servers where they can build up their own communities. Though Discord started off geared towards gaming, it’s started to branch out past the gaming world and become a place for anyone to talk.

If Microsoft manages to close the deal, this would be a major boon for the company, specifically the Xbox side of it. Xbox Live is already a very good service that has built up a very tight knit community. Bringing Discord under Microsoft’s umbrella would allow the company to easily integrate the chat service into their Xbox Network. Potentially being able to chat with the members of a given server while on your console or possibly even sending game invites to others through Discord directly from your console would make gaming with friends even easier than before. They could possibly even make Discord Nitro subscriptions a part of Game Pass Ultimate, if not available at a discount.

It’ll be interesting to see what comes of this potential deal if it closes next month. Microsoft is looking to bring more value to the Xbox brand, and acquiring Discord could be a key piece of the puzzle.