The company asked for the hearing after receiving a statement of objections from the European Commission warning about the possible anti-competitive effects of the deal.
A Microsoft spokesperson confirmed the oral hearing.
The Xbox maker announced the Activision Blizzard acquisition in January last year to help it compete better with leaders Tencent and Sony, but has run into regulatory headwinds in Europe, Britain and the United States.
Microsoft is expected to offer remedies after the hearing.
It has reached a 10-year deal with Nintendo to make “Call of Duty” available on Nintendo consoles, a remedy aimed at convincing competition enforcers but which has been criticised by Sony, which wants the deal to be blocked.
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Deal could harm gamersLast week, Britain’s antitrust regulator said on Wednesday its in-depth probe had found that Xbox maker Microsoft’s purchase of Activision Blizzard has raised competition concerns about cloud and console gaming.
In December 2022, The Joe Biden administration had moved to block the $69-billion bid throwing a stumbling block in front of the tech giant’s plans to rapidly expand its portfolio of popular games and catch up to bigger rivals.
Without Activision and its variety of games across mobile, consoles and PCs, Microsoft could struggle to attract users to its budding subscription service for accessing games. Drawing subscribers has become a priority for big tech companies as traditional growth sources such as ad sales become less reliable.
The US software company had said it wanted the deal to help it compete with gaming leaders Tencent and PlayStation owner Sony, which has criticised the deal.
But, in its complaint, the US Federal Trade Commission, which enforces antitrust law, said Microsoft had a record of hoarding valuable gaming content.
