Activision's Rebellious Shareholder Stirs Up Trouble Again; Attacks Kotick
The SOC Investment group has released a letter urging Activision Blizzard shareholders to vote against the re-election of several of the company's board members, including CEO Bobby Kotick.
Activision Blizzard's annual corporate shareholder meeting will be held on June 21. The company's current board of directors is running for re-election, which has prompted the SOC group to issue an open letter, urging shareholders not to re-elect certain members of the current board. Among them are Bobby Kotick, Brian Kelly, Robert Morgado, Robert Corti, Barry Meyera and Peter Nolan.
According to information reported by GamesIndustry.biz, the letter in question accuses management of having failed to adequately address the toxic work culture at the company and, most importantly, failed to address incidents of sexual assault or gender discrimination.
Later in the letter, SOC is very critical of Activision Blizzard management's response to the disclosure of the above problems, claiming that "management's 'passivity' is 'inexcusable' given the 'seriousness of the situation at Activision'. It believes that the execs have not taken adequate steps to improve the situation at the company.
In the second part of the report, however, the investment group points out flaws in Activision Blizzard's corporate structure. It is said that AB's board consists of too many people with exceptionally long tenure, including Kotick (since 1991).
In the final part of the letter, the SOC again demands the rejection of the six directors mentioned above. It believes that this is the bare minimum to begin the process of fixing the work culture at Activision Blizzard.
While it seems unlikely that the board will not be re-elected, investor efforts have borne some fruit in the past. Prior to last year's shareholder meeting, the final decision on executive pay was delayed for a week after calls were made to vote against the company's proposal to pay Kotick a $150 million bonus.
This is not the first time that the SOC Investment Group has attacked Activision Blizzard. Some time ago we mentioned also a group inciting investors to vote against Microsoft's acquisition of the corporation. Admittedly we also wrote later that the deal had been approved by holders of 98% of the company's shares and was likely to go through at the end of June next year, but there is a growing movement visible against the current management team.
