Esports Investing: The Investor’s Perspective

Our guest is Dave Harris from Australia. He is Managing Director at Guinevere Capital. He is also an Investor and former Chairman of EXCEL Esports and a Founding Partner at League of Legends Circuit Oceania.

Our discussion included:

How investing in esports works, including ways for a person seeking investment can have the best chance of securing that all important deal.

Dave’s start in esports coming from a traditional sports background

The very beginning of Guinevere Capital

An overview of esports in Australia: “One of our challenges has always been our geographical isolation, we’re just too far away. Stuck in a small player base.”

A description of the VC and investment ecosystem

Mobile opportunities (of lack of them) in esports in Australia and the world

The Investment process:

• Networking: “First thing is to network. Getting to know ‘important’ people, people who are important for what it is that you want to achieve.”
• The importance of introductions
• The investment timeframe: “My advice is to everyone is that everything takes longer than you planned. Make sure you have plenty of runway.”
• Do you need to be making money if you are seeking investment?
• What does an investor provide in addition to writing a check
• Synergy between investments in an investor’s portfolio

The role of the publishers in esports and how it impacts investing

The story of the start of EXCEL Esports

The growing influence of investment from the Middle East on esports

Should the Olympics include esports? (Hear what Vincent Pereira from the International Olympic Committee told the group at Next World)

Episode Webpage: https://www.gamerschangelivespodcast.com/esports-investing-the-investors-perspective-with-dave-harris

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FEATURED IN THIS EPISDOE:

Dave Harris possesses over 20 years’ experience across top international sports & esports organisations including International & Domestic Cricket, English Premier League and Football League Clubs and his last traditional sports role as General Manager, National Rugby League in Australia.  He has worked at Boston Consulting Group and holds an MBA from Oxford University.  He is a member of Young Presidents Organisation (YPO) and a Graduate of Australian Institute of Company Directors.  Dave has invested in & at times led esports projects including League of Legends Circuit Oceania (LCO), Skybox.gg, Excel Esports and Esports High Performance Centres.

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/daharris1/

Email:  dharris@guineverecapital

Website: http://www.xl.gg

Twitter: https://twitter.com/daveharrisAUS

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/harry_wow/

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PRODUCTION:

Creator and host: Tom Leonard (USA) - https://www.linkedin.com/in/tomeleonard/

Producer: Reginald Nsowah (Ghana) - https://www.linkedin.com/in/reginald-nsowah-09352929/ 

ABOUT THE SHOW:

Play Games. Create Jobs. Change Lives.

This is a show about how to build an esports business from literally anywhere in the world where each week we showcase the journey of esports entrepreneurs and others to learn how they solved a particular problem that everyone will ultimately face.

In Season Two our theme is “Follow the Money”.

I am your host, Tom Leonard. I have a background in entertainment marketing. After working with many amazing esports entrepreneurs from emerging markets, they inspired me to create a show to tell their stories so that others can be motivated to create their own esports business. Gaming and esports can create jobs tackling the problem of global youth unemployment. Creating jobs from playing games. What could be better than that?

Thanks for listening to The Gamers Change Lives Podcast!