In our country, e-sports is the second most popular organization after football and it is growing rapidly as in other countries. While the unavoidable rise of e-sports, which affects the whole world, continues, e-sports, with its worldwide revenue reaching approximately $ 200 billion, today has nearly half a million viewers. The number of those who are connected to this digital sport, which is especially interested in the 18-25 age group, has increased rapidly in Turkey. While e-sports continues to grow with the investments of global companies, it maintains its place as a strong industry. EGİAD also focused on this rapidly developing sector. Kaan Kural, who is one of the first names that comes to mind when it comes to sports commentators in Turkey and the pioneer of modern sports commentators, was the guest of the online meeting held for the evaluations of the members of the Aegean Young Business People Association.
E-sports, or in other words, electronic sports is defined as a sports branch where people from all over the world can play games via the internet. As in other sports competitions, individuals or teams can be brought against each other in e-sports competitions and may require both physical and mental effort and skills as in other sports. Especially in the 70s and 80s, with the spread of arcade halls and the socialization of young people by playing games and competing together, while the origin of e-Sports was created, the introduction of personal computers to homes, the widespread use of the internet and the closing of the masses to homes with the pandemic process, e-sports began to spread rapidly. Today, while many national and international e-sports tournaments are organized, these tournaments provide a professional environment for players to compete, and contribute greatly to the development and spread of electronic sports and athlete concepts. The number of official and private tournaments and the interest shown in these tournaments are increasing day by day, thus paving the way for e-athletes to perform this as a professional profession. Now, e-Sports tournaments have turned into a huge industry with prizes up to millions of dollars, followed by thousands of viewers in the arenas and hundreds of thousands of them in live broadcasts on the internet.
Organizing an online meeting about this developing sector, Ege Young Business People Association brought Kaan Kural, one of the pioneers of the sector, together with its member business people. Making the opening speech of the meeting EGİAD Alp Avni Yelkenbiçer, the Chairman of the Board of Directors, pointed out that entrepreneurship and e-sports are located at the intersection of Generation Z, which they have determined as their priority area, and made the following assessment regarding the growing sector: “The game revenues around the world are around 200 billion dollars. I can say that all sports industries generate a total of 480 billion dollars in revenue. It would not be a misleading prediction to say that the e-sports industry will be bigger than all sports industries before the 40s, with the forecast of this economy, which is growing by about 2030 percent with a rising trend and pandemic. To continue with the numbers, we can say that the ratio of watching young people between the ages of 18-25 in the world is much higher than basketball and it is just behind football with a 5 percent rating. I would like to give another striking figure. One of the most important games of the e-sports world, the League of Legends final was watched by 23 million live and 100 million people in total, and the Super Bowl, which is considered the biggest activity of the sports industry, was watched by 200 million people in total. If we say he will catch Bowl, we wouldn't be too wrong. "
Yelkenbiçer, who also evaluated the social dimension of the work, continued his speech as follows: “I think that it is a team that is supported by everyone who grew up in this geography, a sports team that it supports even if it is not fanatical. While there are memories like waking up in the football stadiums where we all listen to our elders or waiting in line for hours in basketball halls, we can now talk about a world where the Z generation created their own memories, did not hear from their elders and completely had their own fields. "
Speaking later, Kaan Kural, in his speech, stated that he liked the players who generally do not make much noise in sports and who do his job without falling from the game very much and described them as their children. Emphasizing that the excitement he experienced in the field of study continues with the level of the first day, he shared his views and evaluations in the field of e-sports in detail. Drawing attention to the fact that e-sports is on the rise and popular in Central Asia and the Far East compared to traditional sports, Kural says, “It is always asked whether e-sports will replace traditional sports. I think these two sports fields feed each other. It is possible for the two areas to enrich each other. The growth of e-sports is surprising. This sports field, which has existed for 15 years, has achieved an important hierarchy especially in Japan and Chinese culture. Since there is no traditional sports concept in Central Asia, this sector has grown considerably due to the tendency to digital. We can say that it is in the top 5 in terms of resource allocation in these regions. This development is not different in America. Today there are valuations reaching $ 1 billion. It will grow even more with good marketing strategies. There are those who form a serious opinion about taking place even in the Olympics, as it is a field preferred by the Generation Z. In this case, we see that e-sports will occupy a very important place in the hierarchy along with traditional sports. "This sport, which is mentally based, is a very important sport branch that develops and even pushes the limit in terms of hand-arm, mental activity, coordination, reaction timing."
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