Another busy week in the burgeoning world of esports has come to a close. There’s been endemic and non-endemic deals aplenty, with JACK & JONES and Astralis new partnership the pick of the bunch. Genvid and GAMURS also secured notable investment this week as the industry continues to grow.
Astralis and JACK AND JONES parnter
Clothing brand JACK AND JONES and Counter-Strike powerhouse Astralis have teamed up in an exciting new partnership.
The sponsorship will see JACK & JONES design a new jersey for the Danish team, with the ‘first ever performance optimised esports jersey’. There’ll also be a wide range of activation initiatives such as fan hangouts, meets, competitions and a further merchandise collection co-designed by JACK & JONES and Astralis.
Henning Nielsen, JACK & JONES stated: “We are truly impressed by Astralis’ professionalism and strong performance, as well as their dedication – those are exactly the values JACK & JONES believe in. Partnering up with Astralis to create and present something new and unique to the esports scene is a natural expansion and continuance of a strong company history within collaborations.
“Besides an obvious value match, we share the approach to always strive to be the best within our game, and the creation of a new player’s jersey and performance uniform with the unique requirements in esports is a perfect example of just that.”
Read the full article here.
Genvid raises $2.5 million in funding
New York based games technology solutions provider Genvid Technologies has announced a new funding round, and that is has made the Genvid SDK publicly available for all major engines and platforms.
Genvid has been boosted by an additional $2.5 million (£1.9m) of funding, rounding the company’s total amount raised to $4m (£3.06m). The funding was led by Los Angeles-based March Capital Partners, with Chicago’s OCA Ventures also participating.
The Genvid SDK allows game developers and publishers worldwide access to new tools ‘to create unrivaled interactive streams across multiple streaming platforms and providers’ such as YouTube and Amazon Web Services.
This was previously only available to select users. With the SDK, developers can map viewer interactions from a game onto the video itself in real-time. Genvid has developed patented technology that can generate uses for data synchronised to these streams. As a result, livestreams can be monetised through transactions that are uniquely targeted to the individual watching, which should in turn lead to a significant revenue opportunity for game developers through sponsorships and in-stream purchases.
Read the full article here.
GAMURS attract $3.5 million investment
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GAMURS, the company behind esports coverage site Dot Esports has closed a $3.5 million (£2.64m) round of funding in a capital raise led by Aura Funds Management. It has also announced a partnership with Puntaa, to launch an ICO for a daily fantasy sports (“DFS”) site with an esports focus.
The initial report suggests that the money will be used to “expand games coverage” and “go global”. Given the wide reach that GAMURS already has, and CEO and Founder Riad Chikhani’s statement that: “he had chosen to take Aura on as an investor because of its connections to Asia”, could imply that GAMURS is targeting expansion into Asia.
Interestingly, GAMURS has also partnered with Puntaa to launch Skrilla an esports Daily Fantasy offering. Skrilla is already regulated in Australia but outlined plans for expansion to Europe and North America already. It’s not the first esports DFS offering we’ve seen, and it will likely not be the last.
Read the full article here.