AI and the next big esports boom for pro players, amateurs, and entrepreneurs

Presented by Qualcomm Technologies, Inc.

Esports is a billion-dollar competitive video gaming phenomenon, and a booming market. Professional players are drawing larger and larger team salaries, while monetizing their fans on personal channels. Meanwhile, big brand sponsors are turning into team owners and traditional sports team franchises are launching their own esports teams. It’s no surprise that, today, online audience numbers for esports are growing at an incredibly fast rate — tech consulting firm Activate estimated that there were 270 million global fans of esports in 2016 and projected that number to grow to 495 million in 2020. Chinese tech giant Tencent, developer of the first mobile esports franchise, Honor of Kings, generated $66 million in media rights and $64 million in sponsorship deals in just the first half of 2019.