BLAST Premier extends their partnership with Douyu
Published: Jun 23, 2021 - Last Updated: Sep 26, 2022
Popular esports tournament organiser, BLAST Premier, has extended and expanded their partnership with Douyu, China’s leading live streaming service.
The partnership
As part of their partnership deal, Douyu will remain the exclusive broadcaster of all BLAST Premier events of the 2021 season in China. The big change for the expanded partnership is the fact that Douyu will now get a chance to deliver the first ever BLAST event in China.
If you are a fan of BLAST Premier betting, you should keep an eye on this new Chinese fall qualifier. It will definitely be one to watch in the rest of the 2021 season. We could see a major shake up in the best CS:GO players of all time if CS:GO becomes more popular in the Chinese market.
Their reach
BLAST Premier is one of the most popular CS:GO esports tournaments. According to the blog post announcing this partnership, BLAST posted increased viewership last year with more than 83 million hours of content watched across all seven of its Counter-Strike tournaments while delivering the most watched CS:GO online match of all time during the 2020 Global Final.
This huge reach for their CS:GO tournaments is certainly helped by the Chinese market. Douyu, their broadcast partner works with Huya and Bilibili to present the esports tournament to over 500 million monthly active users on their streaming network. This is a huge group of potential viewers as well as potential bettors looking to bet on CS:GO.
Comment from BLAST
Alexander Lewin, VP of Distribution and Programming for BLAST, said:
“In line with our strategy to team up with the world’s biggest broadcasters we are delighted to further deepen and extend our partnership with Douyu into a second year. Douyu’s esports expertise and fantastic reach will continue to provide BLAST Premier’s fanbase in China with the very best Counter-Strike entertainment. We are looking forward to working with the Douyu team on the Chinese Qualifier and welcoming CS:GO teams from China into the BLAST universe.”
The future for media and broadcasting at BLAST
In the past few months BLAST Premier have been expanding their media and broadcast reach. In April they signed eight new media rights deals for the rest of the 2021 season. That means that they can now reach a number of new regions around the world, including Latvia, Estonia, Lithuania, Iceland, Canada, Kosovo, Pakistan, Sri Lanka, India, and the Caribbean. What is surprising is the fact that they have waited so long to include major regions like Canada and India.
Now, BLAST Premier will be shown in 18 different languages and across 157 TV territories. They have inked deals with the likes of SportsMax, Nordic Entertainment Group, and BOLT+. These are all regional TV channels that now have the right to broadcast footage from the BLAST Premier tournament.
Now that their broadcast reach has expanded across almost the entire world, BLAST Premier is well positioned at the top of the CS:GO esports scene. Of course, it is always easier to watch the events on Twitch, but by providing the rights to terrestrial channels and regional streaming services, they could grow their audience.
