Can Online Gaming get you an Olympic Gold?

The online gaming industry is showing promise and I believe it holds an exciting future. Unfortunately, it has been embroiled in some controversy on account of being associated with being a lazy man’s pastime or a game not needing skill. I shall address these apprehensions at a later time.

In this post, I focus on the new heights that online gaming has scaled. I believe it can no longer be thought of as an individual and secluded endeavour pursued on one’s mobile phones or computers. In fact, e-sports are fast making their debut as medal events in many places. E-sports were a demonstration event in the 2018 Asian Games held in Jakarta, Indonesia[1]. In these Asian Games, 24-year-old Indian, Tirth Mehta bagged a bronze medal in an online card game, Hearthstone[2]. E-sports have also been recognised as a medal event for the 2022 Asian Games to be held in Hangzhou, China^[3]. Further, efforts are being made for them to be included as an exhibition event in the 2024 Paris Olympics^[4].

But this is not all. Global viewership of e-sports is also growing exponentially. PwC has reported that e-sports are the top sport by growth rate as of 2018. The growth rate of e-sports surpasses even those of soccer and basketball[5]. In 2016, the number of e-sports enthusiasts and occasional viewers around the world totalled 323 million people. Furthermore, the number of viewers who regularly follow the industry and tune in to watch international competitions is projected to nearly double by 2020[6].

E-sports are also giving conventional sports a run for their money. 43 million viewers tuned into the 2017 championship of the e-sport, the League of Legends. This number is just 1.5 million (or 0.03%) short of the viewers of game 7 of the National Basketball Association finals[7]. Goldman Sachs also recognised in one of its reports that the total online e-sports viewership is over 3.5 billion people globally[8]. This is in addition to 2.2 billion gamers^[9].

It is unlikely that such rapid growth in any industry will go unnoticed by investors. But e-sports have sparked the interest of not only corporate investors but of celebrities and sportspeople as well. The online gaming industry has not just caught the fancy of players and spectators, it has also posed itself as a lucrative investment opportunity for companies such as Coca Cola and Red Bull^[10]. NBA basketball teams from Houston, Sacramento, and Philadelphia, amongst others in addition to the German soccer club FC Schalke also invested in purchasing teams for the League of Legends Championship Series last year[11]. In addition to sports teams and corporate houses trying to get a piece of the pie, eminent personalities such as Jennifer Lopez (who had been part of a USD 15 million funding deal for leading e-sports brand NRG) and NFL players such as Marshawn Lynch, retired New York Yankees player Alex Rodriguez, pro basketball player Shaquille O’Neal, Twitter chief technical officer Anthony Noto, and Fortress Investment Group chairman Pete Briger have also invested readily in online gaming ventures[12].

The pertinent question to ask now is whether India is ready to fully embrace the e-sports phenomenon. Online gaming and the avenues it presents for advertising, sponsorships, intellectual property rights building is largely untapped. The time is right for India to capture these opportunities and poise itself as a global leader in online games’ development, gaming hardware development and for commercially successful online gamers as well.

This post is authored by Ratul Roshan, Associate with inputs from Nehaa Chaudhari, Public Policy Lead at Ikigai Law.

[1] F. Potkin, Esports: Move to less violent games for 2022 Asiad – Alisport CEO, Reuters, 03 September 2018, available at https://in.reuters.com/article/games-asia-alisports/esports-move-to-less-violent-games-for-2022-asiad-alisport-ceo-idINKCN1LJ06T.

[2] R. Vora, Tirth Mehta from Bhuj wins bronze in eSports category at Jakarta Games, 02 September 2018, Hindu Business Line, available at https://www.thehindubusinessline.com/news/sports/tirth-mehta-from-bhuj-wins-bronze-in-esports-category-at-jakarta-games/article24848429.ece.

[3] F. Potkin, Esports: Move to less violent games for 2022 Asiad – Alisport CEO, Reuters, 03 September 2018, available at https://in.reuters.com/article/games-asia-alisports/esports-move-to-less-violent-games-for-2022-asiad-alisport-ceo-idINKCN1LJ06T.

[4] F. Potkin, Esports: Move to less violent games for 2022 Asiad – Alisport CEO, Reuters, 03 September 2018, available at https://in.reuters.com/article/games-asia-alisports/esports-move-to-less-violent-games-for-2022-asiad-alisport-ceo-idINKCN1LJ06T.

[5] PwC, Page 13, Sports Industry: Lost in Transition, available at https://library.olympic.org/Default/doc/SYRACUSE/176566/sports-industry-lost-in-transition-pwc-s-sports-survey-2018?_lg=en-GB.

[6] eSports market – Statistics & Facts, available at https://www.statista.com/topics/3121/esports-market/.

[7] eSports by the Numbers: Industry, Users, & Fun Facts, available at https://muchneeded.com/esports-statistics/.

[8] ESports, from the Wild West to Mainstream, page 3, available at https://www.goldmansachs.com/insights/pages/infographics/e-sports/report.pdf.

[9] ESports, from the Wild West to Mainstream, page 3, available at https://www.goldmansachs.com/insights/pages/infographics/e-sports/report.pdf.

[10] R. Chikani, The 3 types of esports investor: sports teams, celebrities, and moguls, 15 May 2018, available at https://venturebeat.com/2018/05/15/the-3-types-of-esports-investor-sports-teams-celebrities-and-moguls/.

[11] R. Chikani, The 3 types of esports investor: sports teams, celebrities, and moguls, 15 May 2018, available at https://venturebeat.com/2018/05/15/the-3-types-of-esports-investor-sports-teams-celebrities-and-moguls/.

[12] R. Chikani, The 3 types of esports investor: sports teams, celebrities, and moguls, 15 May 2018, available at https://venturebeat.com/2018/05/15/the-3-types-of-esports-investor-sports-teams-celebrities-and-moguls/.