"Sledgehammer's appointment as a steward of the multi-billion-dollar military shooter franchise allows Activision to maintain the series' yearly release schedule. Longtime series co-developer Treyarch will release its own Call of Duty game this year, with Sledgehammer's version following in 2011."
"Call of Duty will now be managed under its own Activision business unit intended to foster "various new brand initiatives." The company says it plans to focus heavily on "high-margin digital online content" and spread the Call of Duty name across multiple genres, in an attempt to reproduce the level of global reach enjoyed by Blizzard's successful franchises such as WarCraft."
"In an Activision statement, neither game had the Modern Warfare brand attached. The only mention of the Infinity Ward-specific sub-franchise was to clarify that the studio is still working on two map packs for Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 due this year."
"The company(Activision) also never hesitates to treat games as a business -- for example, now that Guitar Hero is no longer the cash cow it once was, it closed Red Octane and made cuts at Neversoft, despite the way those studios have performed for Activision in the past."
"Another source with knowledge of the situation tells Gamasutra that although Infinity Ward is only about 75 developers strong, Activision brass demanded layoffs at the studio anticipating a refusal -- which they received, potentially opening the door for Activision to use that refusal as a way to launch a breach suit that would help it escape its contract."
Sounds like Activision is a great company to work for
