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- Douyu has acquired the Chinese live streaming rights for Alibaba Sports’ World Electronic Sports Games (WESG) 2019-2020 season.
- Chinese video platform Youku will also broadcast WESG matches, as the company is owned by Alibaba Group.
- As a part of the deal, Alibaba Sports and Douyu will co-host the WESG Douyu online qualifier between Nov. 25 – Dec. 3, which will send winning teams and players to the WESG China Qualifier.
Chinese tournament organizer Alibaba Sports has partnered with live streaming platform Douyu for the World Electronic Sports Games (WESG). As the strategic partner of Alibaba Sports for the WESG 2019-2020 season, Douyu will have the exclusive Chinese streaming rights for the Olympic-style esports tournament.
Alibaba Sports told The Esports Observer that international streaming partners had not been decided at the time of writing.
The announcement also noted that the Chinese video platform Youku will have the right to broadcast WESG matches, as the company is owned by Alibaba Sports parent company Alibaba Group.
In addition, Alibaba Sports and Douyu will co-host the WESG Douyu online qualifiers between Nov. 25 – Dec. 3, with a ¥56.6K RMB ($8K USD) total prize pool. The online qualifiers will feature Counter-Strike: Global Offensive (CS:GO), Dota 2, StarCraft II, and Pro Evolution Soccer 2020. The winning team and players will go on to the WESG China qualifier. Registered teams and players taking part in the online qualifier are not allowed to participate in the WESG offline regional qualifiers.
Alibaba Sports told The Esports Observer that a few Chinese professional teams will also participate in the online qualifiers, or be directly invited to the WESG China qualifier.
According to the announcement, Alibaba Group also updated a new rule in its tournament system for team competitions (i.e. 5 vs. 5 games). Every national team can have 5-8 registered players, including a maximum of two foreign players.
In previous years of WESG, all team players had to belong to the same nation. If a competitive esports organization already features players from the same nation (such as Fnatic’s CS:GO team or the Brazilian club MiBR), it can compete under its team brand, as opposed to a country flag.
