Tencent Plans E-Sports Events for PUBG Mobile Substitute After Bagging 50 Million DAUs
Duan Qianqian
DATE:  Jun 21 2019
/ SOURCE:  yicai
Tencent Plans E-Sports Events for PUBG Mobile Substitute After Bagging 50 Million DAUs Tencent Plans E-Sports Events for PUBG Mobile Substitute After Bagging 50 Million DAUs

(Yicai Global) June 21 -- The world's largest gaming firm Tencent Holdings plans to open up e-sports leagues and tournaments for Game for Peace, its built-for-China replica of PlayerUnknown's Battlegrounds, after racking up 50 million daily active users in just six weeks.

The Shenzhen-based firm wants to run a world championship, professional league, city open tournaments and events targeting amateur gamers, it said yesterday at a global e-sports summit held on China's island province of Hainan.

Tencent launched the battle royale game on May 8, a month after landing a Chinese gaming license that allows it to commercialize the title. The firm bought exclusive China distribution rights to PUBG -- one of the genre's frontrunners -- late in 2017, but failed to secure a permit to make money from the game as regulators deemed it too gory.

Tencent earned CNY370 million (USD54 million) through e-sports copyrights last year, Deputy General Manager Dai Bin of Tencent's Interactive Entertainment Group , told Yicai Global. It has already made CNY450 million in the first half of this year and is setting up 51 e-sports events with sponsorship from 33 companies, who have pumped CNY440 million into the cause.

E-sports is a rapidly expanding market in China and Tencent predicts that there will be more than 350 million users -- including players and spectators -- this year, up 10.6 percent from 2018, it said at the summit. That would value the industry at about CNY13.8 billion (USD2 billion), the firm added.

Editor: James Boynton

Follow Yicai Global on
Keywords:   Tencent,Game For Peace,E-Sports,PBUG Mobile