Amazon's mobile department has "finalized a one-year agreement to sponsor North American esports team NRG Esports," according to Jacob Wolf of ESPN.com. This marks Amazon's "first sponsorship in esports." Financial terms of the partnership "were not disclosed." Amazon's App Store platform and Coins virtual currency will be the "title sponsor for NRG's 'Hearthstone' and 'Vainglory' teams." The two teams will "wear an Amazon Coins logo on the front of their jerseys, while the other NRG teams will have the logo in line with the team's additional sponsorships." Additionally, the deal will have the NRG teams do a "roadshow of Amazon-hosted events that are to be announced at a later date." NRG Esports CEO Brett Lautenbach compared the sponsorship to that of his company's partnership with Events DC, which "activated at a live event at the SXSW conference in March and will feature NRG events" in the DC area, including "events at the soon-to-be-built" WNBA Mystics arena. In August '14, Amazon "purchased video game livestreaming platform Twitch" for $970M (ESPN.com, 5/17).
