American media group Advance Publications has acquired a majority share in research and analytics firm Newzoo.
As part of the deal, Advance will make a “significant” capital investment into Newzoo to bolster its bid to be a leading source of games and esports analytics.
Peter Warman, CEO and Co-founder of Newzoo commented on the news: “Since the recent rise of professional competitive gaming (esports) as a spectator sport, the border with traditional media and sports is blurring. With new disruptive trends already appearing on the horizon, market intelligence on these topics has become crucial to an ever-growing range of industries. Keeping ahead of the curve requires a specialist firm with agility in its DNA. We are that firm. We set out to find a strong independent partner in media and tech with complementary lines of business. With Advance, we have found exactly that and much more. Being part of the Advance family of companies provides us with new opportunities, such as our partnership with Sports Business Journal – a prospect that I’m particularly excited about.”
Advance operates and invests in a number of properties across media, communications, and technology. One of the global brands in its portfolio is Sports Business Journal. Newzoo will help to support Sport Business Journal’s plans of expanding its portfolio with market data and analytics for traditional sports.
Whitney Shaw, CEO and Co-founder of Sports Business Journal added: “This year we celebrated our 20th anniversary of being the market leader in sports business journalism. It also marked the start of a new phase for our company in terms of expansion and diversification of services. Recently, we acquired the international sports conference company Leaders and invested in The Esports Observer. Adding Newzoo to the Advance family of companies will add innovative power and capabilities to our group and help us build our sports intelligence business. Combining the data and resources that we already have at SBJ with the tech, talent and expertise of Newzoo will be amazing. I cannot wait to get started and share more about our plans in the near future.”
Esports Insider says: Whilst the numbers oft quoted are somewhat debatable, Newzoo has become the go to source of data and stats for many outside esports looking in, and so it’s no wonder to see it be snapped up by such a big group. As long as it continues its esports focus instead of shifting its focus to traditional sports for SBJ, then the boost in capital seems like an encouraging move.