Kuaishou bought the rights to broadcast ESL CS:GO tournaments

The Chinese platform Kuaishou announced the purchase of media rights to broadcast the ESL CS:GO championships from the Huya platform. The agreement covers all tournaments, including Intel Extreme Masters XVII - Rio Major 2022. Financial details of the deal were not disclosed. Note that last year, ESL signed an exclusive two-year agreement with another Chinese platform, Huya.

According to sources, Kuaishou bought the rights to broadcast ESL tournaments from Huya, and not from the tournament operator itself. This means that both Kuaishou and Huya can share broadcasting rights in China.

Selling exclusive media rights to other co-broadcasting platforms is especially common in Chinese esports. In 2019, the Bilibili platform paid $113 million for exclusive media rights to international League of Legends events for three years, including the League of Legends World Championship, Mid-Season Invitational and Riot Games All-Star.

Prior to the League of Legends World Championship 2020, the Bilibili platform sold co-streaming rights to DouYu and Huya so that the two companies could stream the tournament on their platforms, and Bilibili monetized the deal itself.

Recall that the day before, the tournament operator ESL officially announced the next major - IEM Rio 2022 will be held from October 31 to November 13. The first two stages of the championship will be held in a studio format. However, the IEM Rio 2022 Playoffs scheduled for November 10-13 will take place at the Jeunesse Arena, which has a capacity of 15,000 to 22,000 people.