New $898 million esports arena to be built in Shanghai

Construction of a $898 M esports arena begins in Shanghai as the Chinese city aims to become the world’s esports capital.

• Shanghai International New Cultural and Creative Esports Center will cover 500,000 square meters.
• The new arena will have a hotel, a breakdancing facility, an indoor skydiving venue, and many other amenities and is expected to open in 2024.
• The main backer of the new complex is SuperGen, the Chinese parent company of esports team Edward Gaming.

Shanghai continues its ascension to becoming the esports capital of the world announcing the construction of a new esports complex called The Shanghai International New Cultural and Creative Esports Center.

The hub will cost a whooping 5.8 billion yuan (898.2 million US dollars) and will span over 500,000 square meters.

The new park is expecting to attract hundreds of esports companies, as well as offering around 2,000 esports related jobs.

The arena is part of a greater, 1.5 billions USD project backed by SuperGen, the Chinese parent company of esports team Edward Gaming.

When completed, it will become on of the Top Esports Venues in the World!

China to surpass US as the largest esports market

As 70% of China’s 720 million gamers play esports on a regular basis, China is due to become the largest market for esports in 2021.

Revenues are estimated to surpass US$400 million in 2021 and tech giants Tencent and Alibaba are among the top investors.

Tencent, as the owner of Riot Games, and the biggest game publisher in China, announced in November that the company will invest $30.4M to boost the esports ecosystem of Peacekeeper Elite in 2021.

For those of you who are not familiar with the title, Peacekeeper Elite is a chinese rebranded version of PUBG Mobile (also known as Game for Peace).