Pithy headline aside, the amount of money Amazon is paying for Twitch.tv is ginormous - like to the tune of $970 million IN CASH. Definitely a high score! The site is a live streaming site, where users can watch uploaded videos of people playing video games. Users can upload their game videos, to include commentary, as well as create "programming" in the form of scheduled live podcasts and/or content.
A huge score for Twitch and again shows indirectly the value of eSports as well as documenting the shift from traditional broadcast content toward user-generated, web- and mobile-delivered content. The Business Insider story reports that in February, Twitch was fourth in peak internet traffic, behind Netflix, Google and Apple.
For more on this story, see the Business Insider article here.
Showing posts with label eSports. Show all posts
Showing posts with label eSports. Show all posts
Friday, August 29, 2014
Sunday, May 11, 2014
eSports Taking Next Step Into the Mainstream
Continuing with the eSports topic, Major League Gaming and ESPN have partnered to present an eSports tournament at the upcoming X Games in June. The tournament will be based on the Call of Duty game and will have a total of eight teams participating. For the first time, X Games medals will be awarded to MLG professional gamers. This is just the next step for eSports as they move further up in popularity and further move into the mainstream. The MLG/ESPN story on this can be found here.
That's not all the recent good news for eSports. Bloomberg Business Week has a news item discussing the construction of a 15,000 seat eSports stadium near Macau in China. According to the article, "Hong Kong developer Lai Fung Holdings plans to build a 15,000-seat stadium so fans can watch gamers play one another in front of them." The stadium will be a part of a much larger, $2.8 billion gaming theme park planned for Hengquin Island, near to Macau. Macau rapidly grew into one of the largest gaming destinations in the world in just a few years. It appears China is looking to be a world leader in this form of gaming as well. According to Bloomberg, more than 500 million people in China play video games. Contrast that to the total population of the US, which is barely above 300 million and you get a perspective on just how big gaming is in China.
Quoting further from the Business Week article, they note that the Activision Call of Duty tournament in March had a $1 million prize purse. It is apparent eSports is getting big and getting big fast. Again, keep an eye on eSports.
That's not all the recent good news for eSports. Bloomberg Business Week has a news item discussing the construction of a 15,000 seat eSports stadium near Macau in China. According to the article, "Hong Kong developer Lai Fung Holdings plans to build a 15,000-seat stadium so fans can watch gamers play one another in front of them." The stadium will be a part of a much larger, $2.8 billion gaming theme park planned for Hengquin Island, near to Macau. Macau rapidly grew into one of the largest gaming destinations in the world in just a few years. It appears China is looking to be a world leader in this form of gaming as well. According to Bloomberg, more than 500 million people in China play video games. Contrast that to the total population of the US, which is barely above 300 million and you get a perspective on just how big gaming is in China.
Quoting further from the Business Week article, they note that the Activision Call of Duty tournament in March had a $1 million prize purse. It is apparent eSports is getting big and getting big fast. Again, keep an eye on eSports.
Saturday, April 26, 2014
Free Market Research Info on eSports Available
I saw this item a couple of months back, but just getting around to commenting on it now. There is a new sport gaining popularity. It's not horse racing, auto racing, skateboarding or extreme skiing (although all are nice sports). What is getting more popular is eSports. What is eSports? These are sports where the participants play games on electronic devices, like consoles and computers. These gamers play games like Call of Duty, StarCraft, etc. competitively. There are actual leagues for eSports like Major League Gaming and online video sites dedicated to broadcasting eSports content, like Twitch. I do spend time on both sites, and find both sites entertaining and engaging.
Here's the item. NEWZOO marketing research has some good info on the eSports market that they're making available for free. You can find this article at this link. I won't steal NEWZOO's thunder and repeat the information, but I'll highlight just a couple of data points.
The first is that there are currently over 47 million eSports players and viewers in the US and Western Europe. For the US alone, it is approximately 28 million. If you compare that to the current estimate of fantasy sports players in the US of over 33 million, eSports is generally comparable in size. Fantasy sports is a multi-billion dollar industry, so eSports' popularity is worth noting.
The second is the percentage of female participation. For fantasy sports participants, approximately 20% are women. For eSports, over 30% are women. This is a big difference and a big positive for eSports. That larger female participation directly impacts the industry size upside.
Keep an eye on the growth of eSports.
Here's the item. NEWZOO marketing research has some good info on the eSports market that they're making available for free. You can find this article at this link. I won't steal NEWZOO's thunder and repeat the information, but I'll highlight just a couple of data points.
The first is that there are currently over 47 million eSports players and viewers in the US and Western Europe. For the US alone, it is approximately 28 million. If you compare that to the current estimate of fantasy sports players in the US of over 33 million, eSports is generally comparable in size. Fantasy sports is a multi-billion dollar industry, so eSports' popularity is worth noting.
The second is the percentage of female participation. For fantasy sports participants, approximately 20% are women. For eSports, over 30% are women. This is a big difference and a big positive for eSports. That larger female participation directly impacts the industry size upside.
Keep an eye on the growth of eSports.
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