JDG Gaming (also known as JingDong Gaming), a Chinese esports group, has announced a partnership with Intel Corporation. The two sides agreed to a two-year deal in which the JDG League of Legends roster will compete in the LPL under the name JDG Intel Esports Club. The deal’s financial specifics were not disclosed.
JDG Gaming is the esports division of Jing Dong, a Chinese e-commerce corporation. The club announced a makeover in May, as well as plans to relocate its headquarters to Beijing, where Jing Dong is based. JDG Gaming now has roughly 15 sponsors, including DouYu, an online video streaming service, and Samsung, an electronics business.
JDG Gaming isn’t the first company to sell the name of one of its teams. The club had already inked a deal with Qualcomm, which became the title sponsor of the JDG’s Peacekeeper Elite team (the Chinese mobile version of PUBG).
Previously, TSM secured a 10-year, $210 million USD deal with cryptocurrency exchange startup FTX to become TSM FTX, and Dignitas secured a four-year deal with online banking startup QNTMPAY to rename their LCS squad to Dignitas QNTMPA. The agreement between Dignitas and QNTMPAY is for four years. This is the first such collaboration in LCS since the league’s transition to a franchise format.
Read More – TSM signs largest naming rights deal worth $210 Million with FTX
Changing the name for the sponsor is not new in Esports, Some League of Legends teams from other regions already included sponsor names in their names. For example, in December 2020, the Korean esports club DAMWON Gaming and the car company KIA Motors announced a partnership. As a result of this collaboration, the League of Legends roster was renamed DWG KIA.
