DreamHack signs three-year agreement for ESL Pro Tour with TV 2 Denmark
TV2 Denmark has acquired Danish rights to DreamHack and ESL’s CS:GO tournament circuit, ESL Pro Tour, for 2020-2023
STOCKHOLM – Today, DreamHack and ESL (both part of Modern Times Group MTG AB) announced that TV2 Denmark has acquired the Danish rights to the companies’ joint Counter-Strike: Global Offensive (CS:GO) tournament circuit, ESL Pro Tour, which was announced earlier this year. TV 2 Denmarks acquisition follows a partnership between DreamHack, ESL, and TV 2 Denmark initiated at the beginning of 2019 and includes DreamHack’s renowned CS:GO tournaments DreamHack Open and DreamHack Masters.
The agreement is a three-year deal starting in 2020 and expiring February 2023, thus bringing the recently announced ESL Pro Tour in Counter-Strike: Global Offensive (CS:GO) to a broad Danish audience.
"It is very important to us that the viewers at home get just as great an experience as the on-site audience when watching DreamHack Open and DreamHack Masters", said Peter Nørrelund, co-CEO, DreamHack. "Over this past year, TV 2 Denmark has shown that they are able to provide the Danish audience with just that, a great experienced based on a combination of their high-quality production, a dedicated team, and our content. We are therefore excited to announce this new agreement which will make TV 2 Denmark the go-to source for DreamHack CS:GO content until 2023. This is a strong testament to the attractiveness of the new ESL Pro Tour, which has the potential to revolutionize the world of competitive esports, and significantly lower barriers for advertisers and broadcasters to engage with esports as a channel to reach their key audiences."
As part of the agreement TV 2 has platform-neutral exclusive rights in the Danish language. The primary exploitation of the content will be on the linear channel TV 2 Zulu and on the OTT-service, TV 2 Play, which through 2019 has been very successful with the coverage of esports.
“Over the past year, with TV 2 Zulu as a sender, we have embraced esports and have built an amazingly dedicated community across our live TV broadcasts and social platforms. The result has been high shares and a Danish vote in one of the biggest sports of the future for the younger target groups. That's why we're thrilled to have secured a big part of the core esports rights for a three-year period”, said Sune Roland Jensen, Content Manager for TV 2 Zulu and TV 2 Play.
The coverage of TV 2 Zulu and TV 2 Play of the esports tournaments is in the hands of TV 2 Sport. From here, the focus is on both covering the sport with high professionalism and on bringing viewers and users close to the big events.
"Our ambition at TV 2 has been that esports should be for TV 2 Zulu, what Tour de France and cycling, in general, have been for TV 2. And we have succeeded. Viewers and users come again and again because they like our coverage", said editorial director Allan Hvid, TV 2 Sport.
The details of the agreement such as pricing of the media rights are confidential information and will not be disclosed by either of the parties.
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TV2 Denmark media contact:
Sune Roland Jensen, Content Manager, TV2 Zulu and TV 2 Play
+45 30 100 106 | suro@tv2.dk
ABOUT TV 2 DENMARK
TV 2 Denmark is a media company with digital ambitions and a long-standing, strong position in the Danish TV market. The company operates the public service channel TV 2 and the niche channels TV 2 Zulu, TV 2 Charlie, TV 2 Fri, TV 2 News, TV 2 Sport and (from January 2020) TV 2 Sport X, and overall the channel family is Denmark's most popular. The TV 2 Play streaming service is the company's digital payment universe, while tv2.dk and apps are TV 2's freely available platforms. Across channels and platforms, TV 2 has contact with over 80 percent of Danes within a week.
ABOUT ESL
ESL is the world’s largest esports company. Founded in 2000, ESL has been shaping the industry across the most popular video games with numerous online and offline competitions. It operates high profile, branded international leagues and tournaments such as ESL One, Intel® Extreme Masters, ESL Pro League and other top tier stadium-size events, as well as ESL National Championships, grassroots amateur cups and matchmaking systems, defining the path from zero to hero as short as possible. With offices all over the world, ESL is leading esports forward on a global scale. ESL is a part of MTG, the leading international digital entertainment group. About.eslgaming.com.
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