E-sports An Alternative Future for Televised Sports?
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The 20,000 foot view: E-sports continue to gain attention, with more brands seeking to enter the space populated as it is by a succession of new leagues, competitions and teams. But for all the hype, e-sports has not yet managed to deliver the scale of audience that the market activity warrants. This does not mean that e-sports will fail to meet expectations, but rather that the path to success may differ from that being currently followed. Traditional sports may feel little meaningful threat in the near term, but as Gen Z ages, they may find distinctions between televised sports and watching gamers play increasingly irrelevant.
Key findings:
-
of consumers attend e-sports events, a figure that varies little by market and that has been relatively flat since 2016
- The of consumers that watch games videos represent the addressable market for e-sports
- Gaming video streams are to gaming what televised sports are to live sports
- E-sports need to build an organic base of small event communities to drive longer-term success of larger events
- A key question is how e-sports will perform as a live sport compared to televised
- IOC president Thomas Bach rejected e-sports’ consideration for future Olympics in September 2018
- As Gen Z games fans age, current delineations between televised sports and e-sports will matter less
Companies and brands mentioned in this report: Amazon, Audi, AT+T, BBC, Caffeine, Coca Cola, eNations Cup, ESPN, FIFA, Fortnite, Geico, Google, FIFA, IOC, Live Nation, McLaren, NBA, NBA League, Ninja, Stadia, Sky, The Olympics, Tfue, The World Series, Twitch, Visa, YouTube