Online sports betting platform Betway will sponsor September's FACEIT London Major for Counter-Strike: Global Offensive. It is CS:GO's first Major tournament in London and also the first Major that Betway is sponsoring. The FACEIT London Major will take place at The SSE Arena, Wembley, from Sept. 20-23 and feature a $1M prize pool. Betway is also sponsoring the FACEIT Minors qualifying circuit, which is currently taking place at Twickenham Stadium (THE ESPORTS OBSERVER, 7/18).
TAKING A SWING: Nippon Professional Baseball is "ready to take a swing at esports." This fall, the league will partner with Konami to launch the Pawapuro Pro League, an esports league that will "bring together pro baseball and pro gamers." Players in the league will compete using the '18 edition of Konami's "Jikkyo Powerful Pro Yakyu" series (JAPAN TIMES, 7/19).
'NEW SPORTS': Foundry IV partnered with Hyperice, a sports fitness technology company specializing in health and wellness. The global partnership will include a platform called "Move" targeted at "new sports" competitors to "enhance these disciplines" (TEO, 7/19).
'THE ESPORTS EXPERIMENT': Swiss bank PostFinance "will launch its own League of Legends squad" on Jan. 1. The bank "will fully finance the team for one year," providing housing, coaching staff and a 2,500 Swiss francs ($2,500) monthly salary for each player. For its esports operations, PostFinance will partner with Swiss esports agency MYI Entertainment (TEO, 7/18).
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