Love was in the air as the Esports Integrity Coalition (ESIC) hosted the first ‘Future of Esports in Las Vegas’ summit on Tuesday 14 February at the University of Nevada. 
The purpose of the summit was for key stakeholders in the esports space to meet with city and state officials to discuss potential strategy, policy and initiatives aimed at accelerating the growth and value of esports in Las Vegas.
Esports has become something of a focus for the gambling capital of North America as stakeholders look for ways to get younger audiences back through their casino doors.
The behind closed doors summit was chaired by ESIC’s Integrity Commissioner, Ian Smith, and was attended by the likes of A.G. Burnett, Chairman Nevada State Gaming Control Board, Unikrn CEO Rahul Sood, Professor Brett Abarbanel, the Director of Research IGI, and Chris Grove, Partner Narus Advisors.
Also in attendance, amongst others, were Seth Schoor, CEO of the Downtown Grand, Carson Knuth, Co-Founder of Leet LLC and Co-owner, Rogue Esports and Blaine Graboyes the CEO at GameCo. We recently spoke to Blaine about his company’s move in and beyond the casino space, and his ambitions for 2017. ESIC, whose aim is to ‘to be the recognised guardian of the sporting integrity of esports’, includes in its partners ESL, DreamHack, Intel, Pinnacle, eBettle, Unikrn, Betway and more.
ESIC Commissioner Ian Smith said of the meeting in Vegas: “This summit marks a positive first step in Las Vegas’ ambition to be the home of esports. All stakeholders were given the opportunity to have their say and initially we share a lot of common ground and there are no obvious barriers to moving forward.
“Following this constructive meeting, the group will continue the discussion at a second summit where we aim to involve more casinos and more publishers.”
Esports Insider says: Expect Las Vegas to make a big play in its ambitious bid to become the global ‘capital of esports’ this year. More publishers being involved in future summits should prove interesting especially regarding how the worlds of gambling and esports interact in the future.
