Today, we’re excited to announce the launch of Esports betting in ZenSports, beginning with League of Legends and Counter-Strike: GO.
Up until now, the ZenSports team has remained focused entirely on traditional sports betting for professional and collegiate live sporting events across 36 prominent worldwide sports leagues, as well as daily fantasy sports contests. But with almost all of the major sports leagues put on hold last month due to COVID-19, sports bettors have been left with very little to look forward to.
With traditional sports betting representing more than a $100B industry worldwide, we’ve been poised since our launch in March 2019 to capture a large piece of this pie. We had our best month ever in February, processing over $2.5M worth of bets in our platform. Everything changed last month when all of the major sports leagues postponed their matches due to COVID-19.
Like other sports betting products, betting completely stopped within our app as of mid-March. It was an extremely challenging situation, but nothing that a scrappy, resourceful startup like ZenSports couldn’t handle. In just under two weeks, our team was able to build a great Esports betting experience right inside our app. And this update comes after we built and launched our partnership with Prime Trust, LLC to offer fiat deposits and withdrawals in just 3 weeks.
While Esports betting isn’t as popular as traditional sports betting (at least for now), there’s reason to believe that Esports betting is poised for major growth. As more people around the world stay locked down due to COVID-19, the demand for at-home sports entertainment is expected to grow. Esports gives bettors the same live, real-time excitement that comes with traditional sporting events, without the mass gatherings and crowds typically associated with traditional sports.
For us, this update does not represent a pivot to Esports, but rather a new product offering for our customers. In the coming weeks, we also plan on adding MMA, NASCAR, and additional soccer leagues to ZenSports. When the traditional leagues eventually come back, our customers will have an even wider array of options to choose from within our app.
We’re confident that traditional sports leagues will return soon. In the meantime, this update provides an exciting alternative for sports bettors around the world.
You can download the ZenSports app in both the App Store (iOS) on the ZenSports website (Android).
