The Esports Roundtable is a podcast that hosts different guests each and every week, discussing all things business in esports.
This week’s episode of The Esports Roundtable features David Harris of Guinevere Capital, the holding company for LG Dire Wolves, Esports High-Performance Centre (at the Sydney Cricket Ground precinct), and EGAA (Esports Games Association Australia). This week, host Joe Hills and Harris discuss the state of Oceanic esports.
Expanding the podcast beyond the scope of European and North American esports, Hills and Harris delve into a range of topics – looking at how they apply to esports in Oceania.
Harris explains that previously in his career he worked in traditional sports as a Sports Physio, so he has experience with a multitude of teams in already-established sports. He worked with Australian football teams but explains that he also spent over a year working with the Sri Lanka Cricket team. 11 years working in Football, Rugby, and Cricket in the United Kingdom.
As Harris explains early on in the podcast, he decided to change direction in his career when he realised he had achieved everything he wanted to in sports. First, studying for an MBA – Master of Business Administration – in Oxford, he then moved back to Australia and tackled a bunch of different roles. He got into esports when he decided to run a sports business for himself, instead of telling other people how to do it.
Beyond Harris’ roots in sports and how he moved into esports, they move on to discuss the Esports High-Performance Centre and the likeliness between the improvement in performance between traditional sportsmen and competitive gamers. From there, it’s the big topic: Oceanic esports.
Harris believes Oceania is behind in esports by a few years in comparison to the other regions, but it’s catching up with advancements in non-endemic sponsors and more tournaments being hosted in the region. Events such as IEM Sydney have worked wonders for bringing exposure to esports in Oceania, especially with big, top-tier organisations going out to compete. Harris believes it still needs more global exposure, one method of this would be having more Oceanic teams competing in international competitions.
Harris commented on the episode afterwards:
“I’m chuffed to see how our projects have been received publically so far and am very optimistic on how Australian/Oceanic esports can mature in the next few years to compete globally for major esports tournaments and for respect in how we engage with our fans.”
Speaking to Esports Insider, Joe Hills, Founder and Host of The Esports Roundtable, commented on this episode:
“Every conversation I have in so called emerging markets of esports opens my eyes to the raw strength of momentum building globally to support grassroots esports + the heights of professional play at the same time. Esports is here to stay and the only question now is how far will we go?”
Hills is the Founder of Looking for Group, an esports executive recruitment company and has worked to achieve placements for many high profile individuals in the burgeoning esports industry.