Bobby Kotick Must Be Removed From Coca-Cola Board in Wake of Microsoft’s Acquisition of Activision

Activision CEO Bobby Kotick has sold his company to Microsoft, providing him with lucrative a way out, but without the stigma of resignation.

Kotick has been under fire for over a year following media reports about a workplace culture that has allegedly enabled – and even covered up – charges of sexual harassment.

“There is something fundamentally unjust about Kotick walking away with a reported $400 million as a result of the Microsoft acquisition without any reckoning for the problems at Activision,” said Paul Chesser, director of the Corporate Integrity Project of the National Legal and Policy Center (NLPC). “We reiterate our request that Kotick be removed from the Coca-Cola board.”

Kotick has served on the soft drink manufacturer’s board since 2012. The NLPC request was made in November and soon after echoed by the SOC Investment Group, an advisor to union investment funds.

Chesser continued, “Coca-Cola CEO James Quincey has interjected himself into a variety of public policy controversies, like Georgia election integrity law, but his own house is not in order. If he is going to appoint himself moral arbiter on issues having nothing to do with Coke’s business mission, he should first clean up his own board of directors.”

National Legal and Policy Center is a shareholder in Microsoft Corp. and in The Coca-Cola Company.