Mentioned in this article
- Twitch has reportedly purchased social networking site Bebo for $25M USD. Other terms were not disclosed.
- The acquisition would be used to further bolster Twitch’s esports initiatives, especially Twitch Rivals, a source said.
- Facebook and Discord were also bidding for the site, according to reports.
Amazon’s Twitch 
has purchased Bebo for a reported $25M USD and will use the social network to build its Twitch Rivals esports programming. Additional details were not disclosed.
According to a report by TechCrunch, Twitch outbid Facebook and Discord for the acquisition. Twitch confirmed the acquisition in an email to The Esports Observer but declined to comment further.
Bebo was founded in 2005 and purchased by AOL for around $250M in 2008, who later sold the company to Criterion Capital for $25M in the span of fewer than two years. The original founders, Michael and Xochi Birch, became sole owners in 2013 by purchasing Bebo back from Criterion and other shareholders for $1M. They experimented with different social networking formats, including streaming and organizing esports tournaments.
In late 2018, Bebo shifted its focus entirely to the esports tournament function of its platform.
Related Article: What Does the Expansion of Twitch Rivals Mean for Esports?
“We are creating leagues for gamers of all skill levels,” Shaan Puro, Bebo CEO wrote in a statement, “We will continue to build for gamers, just in a new way.”
Twitch Rivals is a streamer-driven esports series that pits online personalities against one another. For example, Ubisoft and Twitch partnered to host a Rainbow Six Siege competition at the 2019 E3 videogame convention last week in Los Angeles. The match featured teams captained by musicians Faheem “T-Pain” Najm and Miles “Lil Yachty” McCollum playing against teams captained by popular Twitch streamers. Each team battled it out for a $100K total prize pool, half of which went to charity.
The series has thus far hosted close to 60 events with a combined $5M prize pool. In 2019, Twitch Rivals is planned to grow to 128 events and expand to additional game genres.
