(Yicai) Sept. 25 -- VSPO, a leading Chinese esports firm backed by Tencent Holdings, said it will launch Asia's first premier tournament later this year, with players competing in various games across the continent.

Esports Asian Champions League will cover between seven and 10 games in its inaugural season, which will last for about six months, VSPO co-founder Jonny Wang announced yesterday, adding that the event will produce more than 300 million minutes of esports content.

VSPO will set up a series of extended reality gaming arenas to bring the ACL to fans online while also holding an offline event for the final stage of the season in Shanghai next summer, Wang said.

The new ACL is also a partner of the Esports World Cup, which is funded by Saudi Arabia's Public Investment Fund and held its first tournament from July 3 to Aug. 25. 

VSPO and the EWC are jointly evaluating which games and how ACL can be aligned with the EWC qualifications for next year, the Shanghai-based firm told Yicai.

"Asia is by far, when you talk about e-sports, the strongest region in the world," said Saudi Prince Faisal bin Bandar bin Sultan Al Saud, vice chairman of PIF's Savvy Games Group and honorary chairman of the ACL. "With ACL, to be able to bring and unite all these players together and bring them under one tournament is truly fantastic. 

"The relationship between China and Saudi is a longstanding relationship," Saud noted. “When it comes to esports, specifically, there is so much that we can do together to make this a better industry. And that's not just about investment, but working together to make sure locally, you have the right regulations in place, making sure you have the right infrastructure for players, for fans , for the growth.”

Established in 2016, VSPO runs several esport tournaments covering popular games, including titles such as League of Legends, PlayerUnknown's Battlegrounds, and CrossFire. It hosts over 4,000 matches a year with an audience of more than 800 million. It bagged USD265 million from Savvy Games last year.

Editor: Martin Kadiev