Telecoms operator Telia has acquired rights in Finland from the esports organisations DreamHack and ESL to the ESL Pro Tour.
The new deal, for the Counter-Strike: Global Offensive tournament circuit, is for one year and begins on March 16 when the new season of the ESL Pro Tour commences.
DreamHack and ESL broadcasts will be available in Finnish commentary via Telia-owned services MTV3, C More, Telia TV. The ESL Pro Tour will also be available on Amazon-owned streaming platform Twitch.
Thomas Schmidt, chief commercial officer at ESL has said: “We look forward to working with Telia on great coverage for ESL and DreamHack events and the entire ESL Pro Tour with a strong Finnish angle.”
“Together with Telia we will ensure the world’s best esports action is easily accessible and available for the Finnish esports community via the content services of Telia while also catering to a wider mainstream audience.”
ESL and DreamHack announced the formation of the ESL Pro Tour for 2020 last year. ESL Pro Tour combines ESL and DreamHack tournaments to a circuit which links over twenty CS:GO tournaments and leagues.
Media company Modern Times Group (MTG), which owns both ESL and DreamHack, is targeting to increase the monetisation of sponsorship and media rights in professional gaming with the launch.
This is the latest of recent deals completed by the pair working with traditional broadcasters. In the last six months deals have been agreed with commercial broadcasters TV2 in Denmark and ProSiebenSat.1 in Germany, Austria and Switzerland (including global digital rights that it can showcase on its esports.com portal).
ESL and DreamHack have also agreed media rights deals with esports broadcast and content production company Maincast in Russia and CIS markets, and media company Blake Broadcasting (BBN) in the United States, Canada and Asia (excluding China).