FNATIC

INSIGHTS:
ESPORTS
COVID
REPORT
FNATIC INSIGHTS:
ESPORT COVID UPDATE

INTRO

As the human tragedy of COVID-19 continues

to unfold, its harsh impact on business will have
repercussions for years to come. Social distancing,
border closure and self-isolation have damaged
the entertainment, sports and leisure industries in
particularly acute ways.

Strict lockdown restrictions, and the need to keep

adults and children alike busy and engaged, created
an unprecedented scarcity of choice and availability
of new entertainment. Esports has been perhaps the
most substantial beneficiary of this shift in attention.

As the vast majority of households globally now have

access to an internet-connected entertainment
device, the short tap to mobile gaming or app-based
streaming made gaming and esports the most
immediately-available distraction from the grim events
dominating the news cycle.

Viewers who found themselves “completing Netflix”

increasingly turned instead to the world of live and
VOD content, many for the very first time. What
they discovered there was a level of interaction
and engagement with creators and celebrities that
outstrips traditional TV and OTT platforms.

In this report, we will explore the effects of COVID-19

on esports events and their move to online
broadcasting, the effects on publishers and game
developers including revenues, the “drive to live” for
esports content, and finally, the rapid embrace of
esports by traditional sports.
 FNATIC INSIGHTS:
ESPORT COVID UPDATE

01.
EFFECTS ON
ESPORTS
 FNATIC INSIGHTS:
ESPORT COVID UPDATE

OFFLINE
EVENTS:
AFK

While COVID-19 was still in its early stages of

development as a global pandemic, esports was one
of the first industries to take decisive action to limit
access to live events for supporters.

Given the relative immaturity of esports to traditional

sports, it’s interesting (and a positive indicator of
overall industry maturity) that esports tournament
organisers were arguably the more proactive
operators in managing the initial risks of COVID-19.

For example, several weeks prior to the ‘business as

usual’ completion of the UK’s Cheltenham Festival
racing event (10-13 March) and the UEFA Champions
League fixture between Liverpool and Atlético Madrid
(11 March), ESL’s IEM Katowice CS:GO ‘major’ took
place behind closed doors; and thereafter almost all
major esports competitions moved rapidly to a wholly
online set-up.

Even if the bulk of spectators are viewing online,

closing the doors of a major esports event wasn’t
a step to take lightly. As well as a platform to sell
merchandise and activate the esports community, live
esports events offer an opportunity for sponsors to
speak directly to fans, and for teams to showcase the
passion of their communities to those sponsors.

For non-endemic sponsors, high-attendance esports

arena events also provide a comfortable jumping-
off point for a first investment into esports, given
their similarity to live sporting or convention-style
activations.

intelextrememasters.com, IEM Katowice 2020

 FNATIC INSIGHTS:
ESPORT COVID UPDATE

ONLINE IS BACK (AND

BETTER THAN EVER)
Following the changes to IEM Katowice, COVID-19 ESPORTS EVENTS RESPONSE
forced other league and tournament organisers
across all titles to change their events. Some
31.6% - shifted online 23.5% - cancelled
cancelled or postponed their events - but most
shifted them online, taking esports back to its early
local network-based roots.

The variations did not stop at the shift from physical to

digital. We also saw:

Restructuring of several tournament series into

regional leagues (instead of standard qualifier-
to-international-tournament pathways). For
example, the CS:GO competition DreamHack
Masters, which was scheduled to take place live
in Jönköping, Sweden, transitioned to a regional 44.9% - postponed
format.

Increased focus on community activation by FOR THE PERIOD FROM JAN-MAY 2020, 98
developers, via community-based and ‘pro-am’
TOURNAMENTS OR EVENTS WERE CANCELLED
tournaments. After cancelling the upcoming
Rainbow Six Siege events, Ubisoft announced
IN TOTAL[1]
weekly, cross-platform, fully open online
community tournaments.

DreamHack Masters Spring 2020: Europe | Dot Esports

[1]
EsportsObserver , ESPN  / Liquidpedia
 FNATIC INSIGHTS:
ESPORT COVID UPDATE

ECONOMIC IMPACT

While physical esports events will return eventually,
teams and developers have seen the scale benefits
of well-organised online events. Contractual
restrictions applied by developers to online
activations in the pre-COVID world (and particularly
to the use of team sponsor content in in-game
inventory) have been temporarily disabled. This has
led to a bigger inventory of online assets for teams to
monetise online.
MODERN TIMES GROUP Q1 20 UPDATE
(OWNER ESL/DREAMHACK)
REVENUE IN OUR ESPORT VERTICAL IS
EXPECTED TO DECLINE BY 25-35 PERCENT
IN 1H 2020, COMPARED WITH OUR
CORRESPONDING PERIOD IN 2019[2].

As the organisations most reliant on the physical 2020 ESPORTS REVENUE STREAMS (GLOBAL)
elements of esports, tournament and league - NEWZOO APRIL 2020 REFORECAST
operators have taken the most substantial hit from
$614.9M
offline event cancellations. For example, while +13.1%
YoY

Modern Times Group (the parent company of both

digital festival company DreamHack and esports
events company ESL) announced a small (2% YoY)
Q1-20 net sales decline, principally driven by a decline
in esports segment of 11% (due to events properties
being moved online or not happening altogether). $176.2M
+11.5%
Additionally it predicts its operations vertical to drop YoY $120.2M
$106.5M
-2.5%
+0.8%
25-35% for H1-20 overall[2]. YoY
YoY
$21.5M $19.9M
+60.9% +44.9%
YoY YoY

In line with this, esports consulting agency and data

Sponsorship Media Merchandise Publisher Digital Streaming
service Newzoo has revised its estimate of total Rights & Tickets Fees

esports revenues for 2020 to $1.06B, down from

its previous estimate of $1.1B (but still up YoY vs
2019). Newzoo’s re-forecast predicts the biggest
percentage revenue drop off in the “merchandise
and tickets” vertical (down 12.2% / US$15m), which
is mainly connected to offline events, along with a
decrease in “media rights” (down 4.8% / US$176M)
and “sponsorship” ( down 3.4% / US$615M)
categories. On the other end, they plan an increase in
the “streaming” (up 9.3% US$19.9M) and “publisher
fees” (up 3.3% / US$120.2M) categories (see graph for
full picture).

[2]
MTG press release
 FNATIC INSIGHTS:
ESPORT COVID UPDATE

02.
EFFECTS ON
PUBLISHERS
 FNATIC INSIGHTS:
ESPORT COVID UPDATE

MORE FREE TIME,

MORE GAMING?
Pre-COVID it was already the case that gaming’s NUMBER OF PLAYERS OF CALL OF DUTY: WARZONE
share of time and wallet was increasing, particularly WORLDWIDE AS OF APRIL 2020
among young people - but COVID hyper-accelerated 60
50
that trend.

Number of players in millions

30
Per Nielsen, 4 out of 5 global consumers played video 30

games or watched video game content during the 15

height of the COVID-19 pandemic lockdowns. 6

In general the industry saw a 46% daily active user Mar 10, 2020 Mar 13, 2020 Mar 20, 2020 Apr 10, 2020

increase in PC gaming and 17% increase in mobile

gaming. This led to a growth in microtransactions,
THE FREE-TO-PLAY CS:GO SAW AN INCREDIBLE RISE IN
PLAYER BASE
with In-App Purchase (IAP) Revenue for mobile
1400
games increasing by 24% since the pandemic was
declared[3]. 1200
Number of players in thousands

All in all Superdata[4], game spending reached $10.5B 1000

in April 2020 (+17% YoY), with earnings growing in PC

800
(+12% YoY), mobile (+14%) and console (+42%).
Predictably, social distancing measures also led to an 600

increase in online play. Almost a third of of US-based

gamers reported spending more time gaming with 400

friends online. Median playtime on Steam (a platform

S e ‘ 16

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for developers of all sizes to launch games) increased,

as did peak concurrent play (20.31M in March 2020,
roughly 2x April 2017).

MONTHLY NUMBER OF PEAK CONCURRENT PLAYERS OF ROCKET LEAGUE ON STEAM WORLDWIDE FROM JANUARY
2016 TO MAY 2020
125

115

105

95
Number of players in thousands

85

75

65

55

45

35
May ‘20
Apr ‘20
Mar ‘20
Feb ‘20
Jan ‘20
Dec ‘19
Nov ‘19
Oct ‘19
Sept ‘19
Aug ‘19
Jul ‘19
Jun ‘19
May ‘19
Apr ‘19
Mar ‘19
Feb ‘19
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Dec ‘18
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Aug ‘18
Jul ‘18
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Feb ‘18
Jan ‘18
Dec ‘17
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Mar ‘16
Feb ‘16
Jan ‘16

[3]
Unity Monetization report, data for March 8th to May 4th
[4]
Super data research
 FNATIC INSIGHTS:
ESPORT COVID UPDATE

DEVELOPERS FTW

ELECTRONIC ARTS INC. Q1-20 saw further cementing of the central role of
developers to the esports ecosystem. Nintendo’s
128.12 USD +2.39 (1.90%) ↑
soothing Animal Crossing: New Horizons helped
130
double sales of its Switch console, with overall
120 console sales increasing YOY by 61%[5]. More

110
recently Nintendo announced that Animal Crossing:
New Horizons had sold 13.4 million copies since it
100
launched on 20 March 2020, making it the highest
90 selling game in the series’ history[6] and the best-
80
selling Switch title (by units and in-game revenue) of
Feb 2020 Apr 2020 May 2020 Jun 2020 all time - quite a feat in two months.

In turn, record engagement and spending in games

ACTIVISION BLIZZARD, INC. led major gaming publishers to outperform the market
75.41 USD +2.41 (3.30%) ↑ on the basis of strong results for the first quarter of
the year.
130

120 In Q1 2020 Zynga (+27% stock price, +52% rev

growth), Activision (+23% stock price, -2% rev
110
decline), Electronic Arts (+8.5% stock price, +%12
100
rev growth) and Take-Two (+6% stock price, +%
90 rev growth) were bright lights in an otherwise bleak
80
picture for shareholders (S&P 500 overall -9.3%).
Feb 2020 Apr 2020 May 2020 Jun 2020

TENCENT HOLDINGS LTD

450.60 HKD +1.80 (0.40%) ↑
130

120

110

100

90

80
Feb 2020 Apr 2020 May 2020 Jun 2020

[5]
Nintendo, Q1 results
[6]
GameIndustryBiz, at 8 May 2020
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03.
EFFECTS ON
VIEWERSHIP
 FNATIC INSIGHTS:
ESPORT COVID UPDATE

ESPORTS VIEWERSHIP:
MAJOR TOURNAMENTS

Among developers, Riot was the most-watched,

with nearly 500M watch hours in Q1-20 (vs 350M for
Valve and 290M for Epic)[7]. Riot’s League of Legends
European Championships Spring Split saw 32M watch
hours (+4.7M), with a peak of over 813K (vs 478K)
watching arch-rivals G2 beat Fnatic in the final. In
contrast to Newzoo’s predictions (see “Offline Events:
AFK”), we expect these numbers to lead to improved
returns for some of the major leagues.

Now armed with stellar watch hours numbers among

extremely attractive demographics, developers
will be looking forward with interest to upcoming
negotiations with streaming platforms and an
increased interest from linear broadcasters.

Fnatic at the LEC Summer Split 2020, Riot Games

MOST WATCHED TEAMS DURING COVID (MARCH 1ST - JUNE

LEC SPRING GROWTH IN COMPARISON TO 2019 30TH)

32.2M
17% YoY Team Peak CCU Hours Watched

1 Fnatic 817K 27.2M

HOURS WATCHED
2 G2 Esports 1M 26.1M

817K
71% YoY
3 Team Liquid 317K 24.7M

PEAK VIEWERS 4 Astralis / Origin 489K 19M

5 FaZe Clan 458K 18.2M

PRO LEAGUE EU GROWTH IN COMPARISON TO 2019
6 Vitality 317K 18M

33.9M
454% YoY
7 Cloud9 379K 12M
HOURS WATCHED
8 100 Thieves 294K 8.5M

490K
203% YoY
Games included: CS:GO/Dota2/LoL/RainbowSix

PEAK VIEWERS Data provided by

[7]
Esports Charts, Streamlabs
 FNATIC INSIGHTS:
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TWITCH:
FULL
STREAM
AHEAD
Yes, YouTube Gaming saw 1.1B watch hours in
Q1-20 (average CCV at nearly 0.5M); and yes,
Facebook Gaming also saw increases, reaching 0.5B
watch hours for the quarter; CCV also increased by
15.5% QOQ.

However, among online platforms, the real winner was

Twitch. The platform experienced a 17% increase in
hours watched compared to the previous quarter and
represents 65% of the market share compared to
the other platforms. Average concurrent viewership
on Twitch increased (MOM) by 16% from February to
March 2020, and then again by 55% into April; for the
first time ever, Twitch surpassed 3 billion watch hours
in a quarter (3.1B, Q1-20, i.e. roughly double YouTube
Gaming and Facebook combined).

These numbers build on Twitch’s explosive growth

as a streaming platform over recent years, with
watched minutes roughly doubling from 2017 to 2019,
and up nearly 32% YoY. As the cherry on top of the
cake, Twitch’s erstwhile competitor Mixer saw overall
viewership and concurrents drop (by -7.3% and -5%
respectively)[8].

TOTAL HOURS WATCHED IN Q2 2020

11.0% - Facebook 1.4% - Mixer

20.0% YouTube
Gaming 67.6% - Twitch

Twitch [8]
Streamlabs
 FNATIC INSIGHTS:
ESPORT COVID UPDATE

Streamlabs, the much-hailed software suite of choice

for many streamers, pulled together their Q2 report of
the streaming landscape and had this to say:

Twitch smashed its previously set records for

hours watched, hours streamed, unique channels,
and average concurrent viewership.

Facebook Gaming reached 822 million hours

watched on the platform, tripling its numbers
year-over-year.

The number of unique channels on Facebook

Gaming increased 55% from last quarter and
tripled year-over-year.

Hours watched on YouTube Gaming Live

increased 39.6% quarter-over-quarter. Streamlabs and Mixer logos

VALORANT was the most-watched game on

Twitch in a single quarter with 534 million hours,
beating Fortnite which peaked at 399 million hours
in Q2 of 2018.
NO MORE MIXER
The number of unique channels on Mixer reached
IN THE BATTLE FOR LIVESTREAM VIEWERS
all-time highs in Q2. However Microsoft’s made
AND WATCHED HOURS, GOOGLE MADE A MOVE a stunning announcement on 22 June 2020 that
INTO DISTRIBUTION DEALS BACK IN JANUARY - it would close the platform and transfer Mixer
SIGNING AN EXCLUSIVE DEAL WITH ACTIVISION ‘partners’ to Facebook Gaming.
BLIZZARD TO STREAM THEIR ESPORTS
This leaves over 5 million Mixer channels that
TOURNAMENTS SUCH AS COD AND OWL ON
need to choose another platform to stream on,
YOUTUBE LIVE[9]. further confirming the consolidation of streaming
ecosystem in the West down to the 3 main ones
(YT, FB, TW).

TWITCH TOTAL HOURS WATCHED SINCE Q2 2018[10] 5.06B

5,000

4,400
Hours watched in millions

3,800

3.11B
3,200
2.77B 2.76B 2.79B
2.66B
2.55B
2.45B
2,600 2.27B

2,000
Q2 ‘18 Q3 ‘18 Q4 ‘18 Q1 ‘19 Q2 ‘19 Q3 ‘19 Q4 ‘19 Q1 ‘20 Q2 ‘20
[9]
The Verge
[10]
Esports Charts
 FNATIC INSIGHTS:
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GROWTH IN LAST 90 DAYS: MARCH 16TH - JUNE 16TH VS. PREVIOUS 90 DAYS
As lockdown began to ease, viewership on Twitch remained strong, helped by the 12 June launch of Sony’s
Playstation 5[11].

4.9B 2.3M 6M
70.3% ↑ 70.3% ↑ 115.6% ↑

HOURS WATCHED AVERAGE VIEWERS PEAK VIEWERS

TOTAL HOURS WATCHED TOTAL HOURS STREAMED

Total hours watched were consistently above 2019
on a monthly basis. April 2020 was the highest
spike, with a 101% increase YoY, while February
and Jan were respectively above by 5% and 7%[11].
Total Hrs watched ‘19 Total Hrs watched ‘20
While the number of hours streamed was slightly
lower in January 2020 and flat in February 2020
vs 2019, the Month of March 2020 shows a 20%
increase YoY and April and May show significant
uptick at 83% and 108% YoY respectively[11].
Total Hrs streamed ‘19 Total Hrs streamed ‘20

2000M 80M

1500M 60M

1000M 40M

500M 20M

0M 0M
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TOTAL NUMBER OF CHANNELS AVERAGE CCV SINCE JAN 2019

While the number of channels was slightly lower in Average concurrent viewership on Twitch increased
January and February 2020 vs 2019, the Month of by 19.5% in Q1 2020 vs. past quarter, reaching a new
April and May show significant uptick at 72% and all-time high, and even higher record for April
88% YoY respectively[11]. (+101% YoY) and May (+87% YoY)[11].

Active Channels ‘19 Active Channels ‘20

8M 2.5M

6M 2.0M

4M 1.5M

2M 1.0M

0M 0.5M
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[11]
Twitch tracker
 FNATIC INSIGHTS:
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CHINA
Althought there might have been a decline in PC
gaming in China during the pandemic due to the
internet cafes shutting down, local streaming
platforms raked up some solid results over Q1 2020.

HUYA Inc. is the leading game live streaming platform

in China. Huya hosts live video game streams and
other esports content.

HUYA’s revenues increased by nearly 50% YOY

to $340.6M. Average MAUs[12] increased by more
than 22% to 151M as fans increased their interest
in game-centric content during the lockdown.

HUYA benefits from strong support from Tencent,

which became its largest shareholder in April
2020. Tencent’s acquisitive approach to the
gaming and esports ecosystem - including full
ownership of Riot, near-complete ownership
of Supercell, and significant investment in Epic
- presages a strong Q2 for HUYA in terms of
streaming content[13].

Douyu is HUYA’s main competitor. The subject range

of its video content is generally wider than HUYA’s.

Wuhan-based Douyu also saw revenues jump

53% YoY in Q1 2020 to $321M.

However their user base declined slightly during

the quarter (down by ~1% to 158.1M), despite
Douyu’s average revenue per user (ARPU)
increasing by 23.7% YoY[14].

Bilibili is an online entertainment and mobile gaming

company, with a wide array of user-generated content
in the style of Youtube.

Bilibili’s revenues increased by 69% YoY in Q1

2020 to $327M, especially supported by the
growth of revenue from value-added (+172% YoY
to $112.2M)

Average monthly active users (MAUs[12]) reached

172.4M, and mobile MAUs reached 156.4M,
representing increases of 70% and 77%,
respectively, from the same period in 2019[15].
[12]
Refers to average monthly active users on Huya platform. Average MAUs for any
period is calculated by dividing (i) the sum of active users on our platform for each
month during such relevant period, by (ii) the number of months during this period.
[13]
PR Newswire
[14]
KrASIA
[15]
KrASIA, Bili Bili Q1 2020 earnings
 FNATIC INSIGHTS:
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VALORANT... WOW.
And if Twitch is doing great, it follows that some of
the 5m+ content creators who streamed through the
platform in March 2020 must have also had some of
their most incredible periods yet. The Mick Fannings
and Kelly Slaters of the content crunch wave included:

US-based streamer and ex-CS:GO pro Jaryd

‘summit1g’ Lazar, whose channel currently leads
in total hours watched on Twitch (49M hours
watched in 90 days)[16].

Friend-of-Fnatic Ludwig ‘Anomaly’ Lagerstedt,

whose signature balaclava and 24/7 open stream
increased his watched hours by 6,700% in 90
days and catapulted him into the second most
viewed channel on Twitch (by watch hours)[17].

playvalorant.com, VALORANT characters

TOTAL HOURS WATCHED TRENDING (JANUARY ’20 - JUNE ’20)[18]

300M

200M

League of
Legends

Fortnite
100M Call of duty:
Modern Warfare
Counter-Strike:
Global Offensive
VALORANT
Dota 2

Rainbow 6 Siege

Jan Feb Mar Apr May Jun

[16]
SullyGnome, at 14 June 2020
[17]
SullyGnome, at 14 June 2020
[18]
Twitch, Newzoo reports

Fortnite with 20M viewers of its events
MOST WATCHED GAMES ON TWITCH, UP TO 16 JUNE 2020
Game
1 VALORANT
2 Just Chatting
3 League of Legends
4 Fortnite
5 Call of Duty: Modern Warface
FNATIC INSIGHTS:
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What did these two wave-riders have in common?
They were playing VALORANT, Riot’s long-awaited
FPS, which launched (in closed beta) on 7 April 2020...
into the most content-starved audience in the history
of content. By enlisting well-known Fortnite, CS:GO
and Apex Legends streamers to distribute closed
beta keys, Riot savvily created immediate competition
(which is useful for a game intended to be fun to play
and great to watch), hype around their launch through
affiliate marketing, and extreme FOMO from the FPS
community (who immediately busied themselves with
the search for beta keys). As a result, VALORANT’s
launch broke Twitch’s all-time concurrent viewership
record, and the game continues to lead the platform
in overall watch hours.
As can be seen from the table below, long-standing
open-world games like Fortnite and Grand Theft: Auto
remained popular with Twitch viewers. A busy quarter
on the Fortnite island was capped with another
meme-ready narrative-driving event, “The Device”.
Fornite’s developer Epic continues to challenge
conventions of what a game can be, hosting within
its ‘metaverse’ (among other things) blockbuster
movie premieres and a surreal Travis Scott virtual
concert attended by tens of millions of fans. Epic also
established areas of its playable universe as
violence-free social areas - opening up a “cross-
platform Second Life meets Facebook” playground
within one of gaming’s most popular battlegrounds.
Watch time Stream time Peak viewers
518.1M 11.3M 1.7M
hours hours
467.5M 7M 839K
hours hours
390M 10M 727K
hours hours
304.6M 24.7M 832K
hours hours
272.9M 16.7M 455K
hours hours
 FNATIC INSIGHTS:
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04.
EFFECTS OF
ESPORTS ON
TRADITIONAL
SPORTS
FNATIC INSIGHTS:
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WELCOME
TO THE
PARTY!
(PLEASE WASH YOUR HANDS.)

During the pandemic, all new content is online - ballet,

theatre, music and even talk-shows have taken a
home-made, self-hosted pivot to digital. Given this
wider trend, it’s no surprise that the first port of call
for fans and broadcasters of sports like football,
basketball and motor racing was to their digital
equivalents - living-room staples like EA’s FIFA (which
sold 1.5M copies in the UK in 2019, making it the
best-selling console game by some distance),
Madden and NBA Live franchises, and iRacing.com’s
NASCAR series.

Converting previously “offline only” sport fans into

consumers of online entertainment content is the first
step in bringing those consumers into the esports
marketing funnel - albeit plotting conversion of a fan
of a ‘diet esports’ / easily understood console game
like FIFA into a ‘full fat’ game like League of Legends
admittedly involves a lot of steps; and query whether
these consumers will stay in the funnel once the IRL
content returns.

Twitter, @F1Media account

 FNATIC INSIGHTS:
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In this regard, it’s interesting that the angle many

press outlets have taken in relation to tournaments
featuring substitute titles has been to focus not on
the FIFA esports professionals participating in online
matches (which include the best FIFA player on the
planet, Fnatic’s Donovan ‘Tekkz’ Hunt) but instead on
the IRL players who have been drafted in to play.

Shout out Norwich City’s Todd Cantwell and Palace’s ANOTHER ILLUSTRATION OF MAINSTREAM
Andros Townsend, lauded on Twitter for their on-
ENTERTAINMENT ENTERING THE STREAM
stream bangers! Football fans who made the move
to Twitch during lockdown will soon have even more
ECOSYSTEM, IS THE INCREASE OF THE MUSIC
reasons to stay with the platform, following the CATEGORY WITHIN TWITCH.
announcement on 19 July 2020 that four live English
Premier League content will appear on the platform
as part of Amazon’s broadcast deal.

MUSIC CATEGORY ON TWITCH (BASED ON HOURS WATCHED)[19]

6.15M

3.84M 3.83M
3.34M

2.26M

1.31M 1.40M 1.26M 1.26M

1.13M 1.15M 1.06M 1.10M 1.19M
1.02M

Week 1 Week 2 Week 3 Week 4 Week 1 Week 2 Week 3 Week 4 Week 1 Week 2 Week 3 Week 4 Week 1 Week 2 Week 3

January February March April

The category has always existed on Twitch but it only

saw meaningful watch hour growth from the third week
of March, when lockdown measures came to effect in
most countries. This led to many music actors to shift
activity to livestream, through the retransmission of
past festivals, DJs/musicians directly addressing their
audience, Beatport organising events or some radios
switching to live stream.

[19]
Twitch tracker
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ESPORTS:
AS SEEN ON TV
As Netflix itself acknowledges, it competes with
and loses more to Fortnite than HBO; and while
penetration of gaming and online streaming into older
age groups remains low, Twitch and its competitors
dominate watch hours among the consumers of the
future. Almost three-quarters of Twitch viewers are
aged 34 or under, with 41% below 24[20].

Not to be outdone by online and OTT platforms, as

countries began entering lockdown, several linear
and satellite TV broadcasters began signing and
scheduling esports leagues.

In March, Norwegian free-to-air television channel

TV 2 Norway announced separate broadcasting
deals with two CS:GO competitions: the ESL Pro Tour,
and BLAST Premier.

In June, ESPN and Riot Games agreed a deal

for ESPN to air the League of Legends Championship
Series (LCS) Spring Split Playoffs with immediate
effect. ESPN had already started to branch back into
esports in H1 2020, kicking off with 12-hour block
incorporating titles including Rocket League, F1, Apex
Legends, NBA 2K and Madden. NBA 2K has also
now announced a deal with ESPN2 to air league
matches (on cable, via the ESPN app and ESPN.com
throughout the season).
League of Legends Championships, BBC News

Venerable UK broadcaster the BBC has also

joined the party, bringing six weeks of the UK
League Championship (UKLC) League of Legends
competition to its website and app, starting 14 June
2020. Rumours continue to circulate regarding
Activision-Blizzard’s negotiations with NBC
Sports in regards to the OWL (Overwatch League)
retransmission.

[20]
Globalwebindex
 FNATIC INSIGHTS:
ESPORT COVID UPDATE

05.
KEY
TAKEAWAYS
FNATIC INSIGHTS:
ESPORT COVID UPDATE

THE TLDRS:
Esports has shown resilience to
COVID-19 and its adaptability and
relative success within entertainment
shows it can adapt to overcome serious
existential challenges.

Of all the winners from the COVID-19

content crunch, developers, streaming
platforms and streamers seem to have
fared best.

Esports tournaments viewership has

held up and grown significantly, with
traditional sports entrance also driving
esports viewership.

Fast movers into the esports space

can take advantage of a rapidly rising
industry at the beginning of a big
popularity spike.

Developers made the lions share of

revenue gains generated due to the
influx of engagement.

Creators, entertainers and IP holders

hold more attention now than
pre-COVID.

But the bigger picture point is that the esports

ecosystem as a whole will benefit from raised
awareness and interest in gaming, particularly
in consequence of its implicit legitimisation by
traditional media.

There are two questions still unanswered - first:

whether, having brought new fans into the esports and
streaming funnel, those fans can now be converted
into enthusiastic and committed consumers of
gaming content; and second, the extent to which
marketing budgets and planning will now be
recalibrated towards digital assets (and particularly
streaming and streamers).

LoL Esports Photos, LEC Spring 2020 Week 1

 FNATIC INSIGHTS:
ESPORT COVID UPDATE

FNATIC is a global esports performance

brand headquartered in London,
laser-focused on seeking out, levelling up
and amplifying gamers and creators.

Our history is unparalleled. Founded in 2004, we are

the most successful esports brand of the last decade,
winning more than 200 championships across 30
different games.

Today, driven by entertainment, Fnatic is the channel

through which the most forward-thinking brands
communicate with young people. We deliver
industry-leading content, experiences and activations
through offices and facilities in cities between
Los Angeles and Tokyo.

15 75M 220
Years at the top Global Audience Championships

370+ 11 $15M
Medal Wins Different Games Prize money won

And a future even brighter. We are forerunners in

competitive mobile gaming, as the first Tier 1 esports
team to launch a presence in India. We pioneered the
intersection of street culture and esports with merch
collaborations, and will continue to lead the industry
in relation to quality of pro wear and fan apparel. Our
pros and creators will generate more than 100m hours
of entertainment content in 2020, showcasing our
global partners to an audience of more than 15m fans
across our social platforms. In addition, our ‘Fnatic
Gear’ consumer products will continue to level up and
amplify the gaming performance of users wherever
they are sold.
 FNATIC INSIGHTS:
ESPORT COVID UPDATE

Thank you for reading.

Compiled by Chloe Marinier, Sam Mathews and the

entire Fnatic team.

All product names, logos, and brands are property

of their respective owners. All company, product and
service names used in this report are for identification
purposes only. Use of these names, logos, and brands
does not imply endorsement.

Fnatic welcomes your comments and queries on this

report. Please contact us at:

press@fnatic.com
chloe@fnatic.com

www.fnatic.com