BAM! Activision Buys Major League Gaming
Last October, Activision announced a new division of their company devoted solely to the growing activity of esports. It was also announced that Mike Sepso, co-founder of the popular esports company Major League Gaming, would now work as Senior Vice President for Activision’s new esports venture.
They wanted more than just Mike. Esportsobserver.com broke the news today that Activision has just purchased all MLG’s assets and the company will be absorbed into their own esports company. The deal went down on December 21, when the sale was authorized in a formal meeting by MLG’s board of directors. Activision paid $46 million for MLG, and if the sport keeps growing at its current pace, this will prove to be a crazy bargain.
It was reported previously that MLG was deep in debt and looking for a buyer, and that Yahoo was in talks to purchase them; however later reports suggested that deal fell through (and now we know it definitely did). What isn’t clear is if MLG will continue under its current brand name or if Activision will go with whatever name their esports division was going to bear.
It’s worth noting that currently, the Call of Duty World League is being run by MLG’s competitor, ESL. The odds of ESL retaining this partnership with Activision in 2017 just became ten zillion to one.