Recently you’ve seen a big push by several larger companies, that are trying to get a foothold into the E-sport gaming scene. Well now we can add Activision-Blizzard to that list as they have purchased the majority of popular E-sports league, Major League Gaming, for 46 million USD. Apparently this deal that has been in discussion since December 21, 2015, it seems that this was something that “just” happened and even share holders of MLG didn’t know about the deal going down.
I have Series B shares in MLG due to the Gotfrag buyout and I was only notified about this sale earlier today, not sure about others.
— Scott Smith (@SirScoots) January 1, 2016
In addition, there was also a change of leadership as the previous CEO, Sundance DiGivovanni, has been replaced with Greg Chisholm, who was the former CFO. Reasoning behind this deal is citing that MLG sold off their assets so that they could pay off their outstanding debt, which would make sense as they have had several financial woes throughout 2014-2015.
It’s no secret that MLG isn’t the force that it used to be, including the fact that it’s rival, ESL, now is running the Call of Duty World League Tournament.
Exciting times! ESL will be working with @eSportsCOD to create an amazing #BlackOps3 #CODWorldLeague in 2016! pic.twitter.com/YVZHSthIxZ
— ESL (@ESL) October 28, 2015
Prior to that the league dropped Star Craft 2 from its roster, a move that has upset many of it’s fans, despite that taking place for some time now. I suppose only time will tell if this was the right thing to do, for both parties and hopefully MLG can come back on top and repeat with it’s former glory days. However, many gamers don’t feel this will happen and is already calling this “The End of MLG”.
What do you think?
