One of the biggest football clubs in the world, Manchester City F.C., is now Arena of Valor partners.
Tencent Esports announced the partnership deal with Man City at the Tencent Global Esports Summit which was held last week in China. The collaboration will focus on Tencent’s top-grossing mobile game, Arena of Valor (known in China as Honor of Kings), with a goal to bridge fanbases between traditional sports and esports.
The deal also leverages esports as a means to improve cross-border cultural exchanges between China and the UK.
The new partnership deal builds on an already productive relationship between the Chinese video game industry giant and the English professional football club. Their previous collaborations focused mainly on the football side.
In 2016, Tencent and Man City teamed up to create content during the football squad’s tour of China. Two years later, the two parties launched a joint membership promotion that improved the Chinese market’s access to Manchester City pay-per-view games, souvenirs and merchandise, and special team offers.
The Tencent Global Esports Summit also revealed Tencent’s collaboration with Chinese sports firm, Juss Sports, which will focus on developing sports facilities and resources for use in esports events.
The Oriental Sports Center, a prominent stadium owned by Juss Sports, will become the first official esports stadium for Tencent’s upcoming tournaments.
Another landmark announcement at the Summit was the introduction of the Tencent Esports Tech-Union, a group that will work together to establish exclusive standards for China’s esports industry.
Operating under the directive of the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology of the People’s Republic of China, the Tech-Union features tech industry leaders Intel, NVIDIA, Qualcomm, Razer, Yesee Tech, China Union, and Tencent Cloud.
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