Kinguin Ends Sponsorship of G2 Esports’ League of Legends Team
Gaming key reselling site Kinguin has announced that it is discontinuing its sponsorship of the G2 Esports League of Legends team. This decision comes after Kinguin’s own League team was promoted to the Challenger Series. The organization and G2 made this decision independently, without any involvement from Riot Games.
However, despite the discontinuation of the sponsorship, Kinguin will still maintain financial ties with G2 Esports. The company has confirmed its intention to continue sponsoring all of G2’s other teams.
This conflict arose recently for the two organizations. Kinguin, which has recently returned to owning esports teams after purely sponsoring them, acquired an all-Polish League team for the European Challenger Series qualifiers. With the team qualifying for the Challenger Series, Riot’s rules regarding team sponsorship and naming rights come into effect.
Rule 4.3.3 of the EU LCS rules document states that “a sponsor which holds naming rights to a Team may not sponsor other Teams in the League in any capacity.”
By discontinuing the sponsorship, Kinguin would align itself with the rules if “teams in the league” only refers to the League of Legends team. However, it is unclear whether having a financial relationship with the organization behind the team would violate this rule.
Conflict of interest in team ownership and sponsorship has been an ongoing issue in esports, particularly in the LCS where strict rules exist. In September, G2 Esports received a warning from Riot regarding an ownership relationship between G2 and Fnatic.
Kinguin, G2 Esports, League of Legends, sponsorship, Challenger Series, Riot Games, sponsorship rules, conflict of interest, team ownership, esports, LCS, Fnatic