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Twitch today announced that it has given control of both Evil Geniuses and Alliance over the the players and player selected management.
Previously both teams were founded and owned by GoodGame, a company that was purchased by Twitch a few years back. Because of the purchase this meant that Twitch owned both teams, which is a bit of a weird thing for the biggest streaming platform in eSports to be doing, especially when they want to work with other teams.
Now to solve the issue Twitch has handed control of everything at both EG and Alliance to the players and player selected management. Twitch will still support them in some ways, but the day to day running, brand choices and contracts and now independent of the streaming company, who will have no ownership stake.
“Evil Geniuses and Alliance are two of the most recognizable brands in esports in no small part because of the vision and infrastructure of GoodGame, a company Twitch acquired in 2014,” said Kevin Lin, COO at Twitch. “We acquired GoodGame for its expertise and leadership in the sponsorship space, and we continue to be captivated by the idea of scaling those services and monetization opportunities to the wider gaming community. We also had an obligation to ensure the teams operated independently and received no preferential treatment on Twitch.”
“Today, we’re pleased to fully realize that independence, as we announce that both Evil Geniuses and Alliance will become independent player-owned organizations,” continued Lin. “While they’ll still be streaming on Twitch and we’ll continue providing support services, both teams’ brands, player contracts, and futures are now in the hands of the players and player-selected management. They will have complete independence and we will work with them as we would any other esports team.”
A press release from the new Alliance team revealed that Dota team co-founders Jonathan “Loda” Berg and Joakim “Akke” Akterhall are both co-owners while Erik Barge is the new COO.
