March 5th, Monday.
After arriving at the company, Zhang Yuan immediately called a meeting with the core members of the E-sports Division to assign tasks for establishing the GOG overseas league.
The employees of the E-sports Division weren’t surprised by this news.
With GOG’s continuous promotion and expansion overseas, establishing foreign leagues was only a matter of time.
However, like Zhang Yuan, none of them had expected that Mr. Pei would choose to establish the overseas league in this particular manner!
An employee raised his hand and asked, “Mr. Zhang, there’s something I don’t understand.”
“Why does Mr. Pei want to collaborate with overseas companies this time, and specifically choose small companies to work with?”
“First, this approach seems rather risky, and second, it doesn’t align with Tenda’s usual operating standards!”
Zhang Yuan smiled slightly: “On Saturday, I had the same thoughts as you, but after thinking about it for two days, I’ve mostly figured out Mr. Pei’s true intentions.”
“Let me first ask you, what do you think Tenda’s operating standards are?”
The employee was stunned for a moment: “Uh… hasn’t Tenda’s standard always been to focus on the long term and take full control of everything? We can see this from the GPL league, where Mr. Pei specifically kicked out all the disobedient clubs and used an auction system for slots to make all clubs follow our arrangements.”
“If we collaborate with other companies for the overseas leagues, we certainly won’t be able to maintain the same level of control as we do with the GPL league. The standards across different regions might not be unified, which goes against our established approach, doesn’t it?”
Zhang Yuan smiled slightly: “You’re thinking about this all wrong!”
“Mr. Pei has never been limited to just one approach. GPL is our own league, but should we apply the same standards to overseas leagues?”
“Although theoretically our goal is to become an international company, to make GOG an international game, and to make the GOG Global Invitational an international event… even so, there are still distinctions in how we approach different regions and countries.”
“Tenda isn’t opposed to collaborating with other companies. In fact, Mr. Pei often shares the pie, such as when building the Thriller Hostels, where he distributed a significant portion of the benefits to investors like Mr. Li.”
“So, Mr. Pei’s approach is absolutely not about controlling everything or eating alone, but rather comprehensively evaluating and making trade-offs between different interests!”
Zhang Yuan paused briefly, then continued: “Indeed, if we could handle everything ourselves and run all leagues on our own, we could certainly keep all the money from team slots, sponsorships, and other benefits. But think carefully, what problems would this create?”
“First, we lack understanding of the markets in various countries and regions, and our promotion strategies might not meet the needs of local players. Even if we could gradually figure things out, losing the first-mover advantage means we would lose a lot of market share, which would be a severe loss.”
“Second, we are, after all, a foreign company entering local markets, which could face significant resistance. If we don’t share any benefits with others, they’ll certainly try to create obstacles for us, which would seriously affect us.”
“Conversely, by collaborating with local foreign companies, we can better tailor localized promotion and operation plans for each region. By giving them sufficient benefits and having them address various obstacles, we can gain an advantage in the competition.”
“As for why Mr. Pei emphasized working with small companies?”
“Obviously, large companies have too many projects, and the GOG league might only be handled by one department, which might not give it their full attention. Once a large company recognizes the value of the GOG league, they might become too powerful for us to effectively control.”
“Small companies are completely different. For them, the GOG league might be the company’s lifeline and main source of income—would they dare not give it their full attention? Even if the GOG league develops well, these small companies would still be at our mercy because their entire livelihood depends on us. If we were to cancel the GOG league authorization, it would be like cutting off their lifeline. This way, we can still maintain a certain level of control over the overseas leagues!”
“So, Mr. Pei’s decision, while appearing to give up some benefits on the surface, actually greatly reduces the resistance to our overseas market expansion and accelerates our growth!”
“If we only had GOG as our sole game, eating alone wouldn’t be a problem. But we have IOI as a competitor on the global stage, and they’re also establishing their overseas leagues. We need to make some sacrifices to stay ahead of them!”
“Sharing some of the pie is done to make the pie bigger, which ultimately brings us more benefits.”
Everyone suddenly understood and nodded in agreement.
Mr. Pei was indeed forward-thinking and had anticipated all these issues!
The employee asked again: “But, Mr. Zhang, this way there will definitely be many differences between GPL and other overseas leagues. If there’s preferential treatment, won’t it provoke resentment from overseas players?”
Zhang Yuan smiled slightly: “I understand your concern, but it’s unnecessary.”
“If we handled everything ourselves, having differences between overseas leagues and domestic leagues would certainly cause discontent among overseas players. From a public relations perspective, we would need to maintain fairness.”
“But we’re not handling everything ourselves now; we’re collaborating with other overseas companies.”
“If there are problems with the overseas leagues, the overseas companies will definitely take the blame for us! If overseas players are dissatisfied, they should go to the local operating companies—the criticism won’t be directed at us first.”
“Moreover, we don’t need to act like a nanny and make other leagues exactly like GPL.”
“Mr. Pei has indeed put a lot of effort into GPL, but that’s because GPL is our own region. There’s only one champion for the GOG Global Invitational, so the regions are definitely in competition. If we completely handled everything, it would essentially mean turning all worldwide leagues into internal leagues. By letting each region decide its own development direction, we can make the e-sports ecosystem in different regions more diverse, which will make the clashes in the finals even more exciting.”
Everyone nodded in agreement.
Obviously, no strategy could address all aspects perfectly. Choosing one approach meant necessarily giving up another.
Although not everyone agreed with the current method, since it was Mr. Pei’s decision, everyone would resolutely implement it.
…
Soon, everyone began performing their respective duties, contacting overseas companies in different regions to discuss cooperation details.
This would certainly be a relatively long process, since everything from determining the competition venues to renovation would take time.
However, since the list of clubs for each region was already available, once the slots were confirmed and the schedule arranged, the league could start quickly.
The sponsorship issues could be resolved while the league was ongoing—these were minor concerns.
Regarding league slots, Tenda hadn’t actually made any hard requirements about how much they should sell for.
Because each region’s situation was different. Some places had developed economies, rapidly growing e-sports industries, and financially strong clubs, so league slots would be fiercely competed for and sell at higher prices. Other regions had slower e-sports industry development with only a few clubs; if they were required to pay sky-high prices for slots, they couldn’t afford them, and the league couldn’t be established.
Therefore, based on each region’s actual situation, the league’s slots, scale, prize money, and other factors would vary. These differences would also affect the qualifying slots for the next Global Invitational.
Simply put, stronger regions would get slightly more slots.
As for the specific partner companies, careful screening was necessary.
Although Mr. Pei had said to find small companies to work with, no one would think that any random small company would do.
Mr. Pei’s statement clearly had a hidden condition: find reliable small companies!
They needed to ensure these companies would wholeheartedly help promote the GOG league.
This meant some staff members needed to fly overseas to conduct on-site inspections and multi-faceted verifications of potential partner companies in various regions.
However, Tenda had always been very generous with funding for such matters. After approving expenses at the maximum level, staff traveling overseas would fly business class and stay in luxury hotels, so it wouldn’t be too difficult.
Now that the GPL league was running smoothly without issues, Tenda’s E-sports Division shifted its focus to overseas leagues and began their busy work.
…
Meanwhile, all employees at Bunny Tail Streaming were also busy.
After securing exclusive broadcasting rights for the ICL with Finger Corporation and Dragon Universe Group, Bunny Tail Streaming needed to arrange a series of promotional activities for the ICL league.
For example, they needed to prepare promotional materials for the ICL league in advance, adjust the sections and tags on the website homepage to place the ICL league in a prominent position for traffic direction, and arrange a series of promotional activities to drive traffic from external sources to Bunny Tail Streaming.
The ICL league had been in preparation for a long time. The venues, schedule, promotional videos, and other elements were all arranged, so once the streaming platform was confirmed, the league could officially begin.
According to the established process, there would be two days of exhibition matches on Wednesday and Thursday. This would test the official venues and equipment on one hand, and test the streaming platform’s bandwidth pressure on the other.
Any problems could be discovered and resolved early, ensuring the ICL Spring Split could proceed smoothly after its official start.
For these two days of exhibition matches, they would invite the two teams that had qualified for the IOI Global Finals, as well as FV Club and SUG Club.
After all, these four teams were currently the strongest in the country, representing ICL’s highest competitive level. Although these were just exhibition matches, they would attract plenty of attention and create a powerful first impression.
The exhibition matches on Wednesday and Thursday would both be BO3 series. If there were no issues, the ICL could officially begin on Saturday.
In other words, it wouldn’t be until the weekend that they would truly verify whether the exclusive broadcasting rights for ICL were worth the purchase.