E-sports peaking during pandemic

Business is booming for this former professional gamer, who just sold his virtual goods company for $4.2 million.

Scenes from the Fortnite Summer Smash video game competition held at the Australian Open in January 2019. Picture: Tennis Australia.

The COVID-19 pandemic is proving a boon for Australia’s fast-growing e-sports scene, according to former professional gamer Luke Millanta who has just sold his virtual goods trading service for $4.2m.

Mr Millanta was most recently chief information officer at ASX-listed FirstWave Cloud Technology, and at the time was the youngest CIO of an ASX-listed company.

While working for FirstWave the tech guru was also the founder and sole employee of a virtual goods trading business, called Deeds, which allowed players to buy and sell in-game items like skins and graffiti tags.

The young executive has this week sold that business for $4.2m to Hive Gaming, backed by rich listers Jack and Michael Wu, of Australian supplement and beauty product company Nature’s Care. The pair sold 75 per cent of Nature’s Care in 2018, valuing that business at $800m, and this deal marks their foray into e-sports.

Mr Millanta will also join Hive Gaming as the company’s chief technology officer as part of the agreement.

The deal comes at a crucial moment for gaming, which has never been bigger amid a pandemic that is forcing whole populations to stay home. Video game consoles are sold out around Australia, and time spent playing video games is estimated to be up 75 per cent, according to research firm Newzoo.

“I’m really happy with the deal,” Mr Millanta said. “This feels like a real moment for e-sports. Gaming is something anyone can do no matter what their physical condition, you don’t need to be LeBron James to pick it up. The prices of virtual goods have doubled in the last 12 months which is amazing.”

Mr Millanta told The Australian he left high school at the end of year 11 in the hopes of becoming an e-sport pro. He did, playing competitive Counter Strike professionally, and he now thinks more Australian kids will do the same.

“I was probably ten years too early,” he said. “More people are playing video games now than they play basketball or football, and I love both of those sports don’t get me wrong. In the next ten years video games are still going to get bigger and bigger.”

According to Hive Gaming managing director Eddy Lee, the gaming industry has reached $152bn and is growing over 15 per cent year-on-year.

Hive is gearing up to launch its first product, Necta, in coming months. Necta is a marketplace where fans can purchase experiences with gaming creators.

“We are seeing a surge in gaming activity and online viewership, with spikes of up to 60 per cent across all gaming streaming platforms, which creates a unique and favourable opportunity to introduce Necta into the market,” Hive Gaming chief operating officer Randall Noble said.

“We are launching at an unrivalled peak time.”