Frankie refused to cooperate with ESL amid the purchase of the operator by a company from Saudi Arabia

Esports tournament host Frankie announced her refusal to cooperate with ESL amid the purchase of a tournament operator by a company from Saudi Arabia. The 32-year-old British event host stated this on her personal blog.

When I was invited to a meeting with ESL about some changes in operations, I thought it must be exciting considering that the meeting was going to take place, but I had no idea that it would not only be a merger, but also a sale now of “ESL FACEIT Group” of the Savvy Gaming Group (SGG), which is owned by the Saudi Government Public Investment Fund (PIF). In other words, the Saudi Arabian government currently owns the largest tournament organizer and three key brands: ESL, FACEIT and DreamHack. The increase in funding the company will receive will lead to improvements in the internal infrastructure and viewing experience in an industry that needs LAN events to generate revenue or at least make an effort to break even.

She also stressed that no one from the company knew about the upcoming deal.

Of course, I don't know how the business works or who/what/where or how ESL is involved, but it's pretty clear that most of the people who work directly or freelance at these companies didn't know anything until the last moment.

The main difficulty with the purchase of ESL and FACEIT by a company from Saudi Arabia is that the country oppresses the rights of women and persecutes sexual minorities.

As the person who spoke about the NEOM deal that was canceled by BLAST last year, as well as the previous two events in which they regretted being a part, my name was mentioned - or even targeted - in social media posts. networks even before I saw or managed to process the news.

All I can do is choose to walk away from my biggest client - and pretty much Counter-Strike, given that most of my work (including non-CSGO related events) is done by ESL or FACEIT. You sacrifice a lot to be in this business - it's not just a job, it's your life.

From now on, Frankie does not want to cooperate with ESL and FACEIT - in the future she will create a variety of content on YouTube and Twitch. At the same time, the girl will work during IEM Katowice 2022, creating content for Predator.