MTS has acquired the Gambit Esports club, Vedomosti reports.
MTS representative Dmitry Solodovnikov confirmed to Vedomosti that the mobile operator bought out the owner of the club — the Cyprus company Praliss Enterprises.
The exact amount of the transaction was not disclosed. According to the portal vc. ru, the general manager of the esports club Virtus.pro Roman Dvoryankin estimated the contract at “several tens of millions of rubles.”
A few days ago, Dvoryankin in his Twitter hinted at the upcoming purchase of Gambit Esports.
Gambit Esports was founded in 2013 and is based in the UK. The club performs in 4 disciplines: Counter-Strike: Global Offensive, Dota 2, League of Legends and FIFA.
A large business in Russia has become seriously interested in the esports industry relatively recently. In 2016, the Russian holding ESforce bought 66% of one of the oldest organizations of virtual competitions SK Gaming.
A year earlier, ESforce received $ 100 million from the structures of billionaire Alisher Usmanov, who ranks 5th in the ranking of the richest businessmen in Russia according to Forbes.
In 2016, Russia was second only to Sweden in terms of the size of the esports market among European countries, and a year ago it occupied a leading position in the region.
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