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G2 Esports fans during the League of Legends World Cup quarter final match between G2 Esports and Damwon Gaming on October 27, 2019 in Madrid, Spain.

Borja B. goes | Getty Images

For the uninitiated, think of sports as you would any other sport. Instead of baseball, hockey, chess or curling, there are video games such as CSGO, League of Legends, Call of Duty or Fortnite. After all, a sport is just a set of rules, a playing field and a competitive infrastructure that includes players, teams, leagues, broadcasters and the audience. Every game in sport has its own rules. Exchange physical mastery for mental acuity. Replace stadiums and stadiums with virtual arenas and game modes and everything else (infrastructure) is similar if you get to the point. Right down to the throbbing moments when the home team wins a one-in-a-million game to take home the title.

Why is the sport getting so much attention lately? For starters, events like the League of Legends World Championships were comparable to the Superbowl in terms of viewership, and young players in the 18-25 age bracket watch 34% more sport than traditional sports. A big reason for this is that the sport, like its audience, is a digital native speaker. In a world where few millennials watch TV or radio, there is sport everywhere. You can stream it on Twitch, play it on Youtube, discuss it on Discord, watch and share clips on TikTok, Instagram and Twitter.

No wonder the sport is valued at around $ 1 billion in 2019 and is expected to grow 400% to $ 4.28 billion over the next seven years, according to Data Bridge Market Research. Some might say that’s a conservative estimate for the global traditional sports market worth $ 388.3 billion in 2020 alone. With more than 2.7 billion players on earth, we barely scratch the surface of what is possible for sport.

In the past decade, the sport has made great strides, moving from a largely underground culture to a mainstream industry. As a global phenomenon, the sector has attracted notable investors such as Mark Cuban, Alexis Ohanian and Ashton Kutcher. Esports even draws capital from traditional athletes like David Beckham, Steph Curry, Rick Fox and Shaq, as well as musicians like Drake, Wiz Khalifa and Steve Aoki, to name a few. The emerging industry offers tremendous opportunities as its infrastructure, professional athletes and teams evolve.

After taking into account the approximately 100-year lead of traditional sport, there is a lot to discover. As someone who started out (2000-2004) in video game tournaments that were scattered across malls (remember those?), It was eye candy to see the gigantic prize pools of modern titles like Dota 2’s 34.3 million International see or Fortnite’s $ 30.4 million World Cup, both similar to the esports version of the World Series or the US Open. It was events like this, and the maturation of global organizations dedicated to competitive gaming, that got me off the beaten track.

In the summer of 2019, my co-founder Gavin Silver and I took the plunge to launch Allstar, a platform that allows casual gamers and esports enthusiasts around the world to create and share professional highlights. Since then (and with the help of everyone’s favorite shark, our investor Mark Cuban), we’ve seen firsthand the explosive growth of esports that has accelerated during the Covid-19 provoked world of the home. These mega esports events? They are seen by more than 500 million viewers, who make up more than half the audience of an even larger market: Gaming Video Content (“GVC”), valued at $ 6.5 billion in 2019, according to Nielsen’s Superdata. GVC includes services like Twitch, Youtube, and others that increase sales by watching other people play video games, whether competitively or otherwise.

GVC is unique to most media in that it is produced by everyone. Well it can be produced by anyone. But, by and large, it’s still done by the professionals. For example, only 3% of Twitch users stream, which is above YouTube’s 2.5% participation rate but is dwarfed by services like Snap, where nearly 60% of users regularly create content. For this reason, everyone should be very careful: there is an epically undervalued opportunity in esports audiences, not just as content consumers but as content creators themselves.

Unlike traditional sports, almost everyone who watches sports actively plays the games they watch. As soon as a tournament is over, these players start, register and play their own competitive games. They have their own moments of fame. But instead of throwing a soccer ball around in the back yard or playing catch with a friend in the park, it’s like you could fly into Yankee Stadium on the fly and throw your own regulation game, nine innings, pinstripes and everything.

The thing about sport is that the gap between the players and the audience is really, really small. They play on similar devices, they lead similar lifestyles, and they play exactly the same games with little to no difference in the rules and the playing field. The primary separator? The lack of infrastructure. The existing esports infrastructure focuses exclusively on professionals. Top players, top teams, big tournaments, big events. Anyone else who play esports games? You are just the audience.

This is wrong thinking which results in a badly overlooked opportunity. With a global, 24/7 community of players playing highly observable competitive games, performing skills, strokes of luck, funny follies, or glorious triumphs – often on par with the entertainment that the pros provide – there are billions of hours of hyper-social, high quality GVC which is extremely underfunded. While today’s professional esports organizations have their own production studios, both aspiring and casual fans lack the resources to create, personalize, and share their own game content. While TikTok unlocked the potential of crowd-sourced entertainment on the smartphone, the esports audience is still waiting for their turn.

The first to “crack” the code of mainstream game content will open the floodgates of a vast market: new content creators who are predominantly competitive gamers who play and create content from the same esports games they watch.

– From Nick Cuomo, CEO and Co-Founder of Allstar.gg, and an avid gamer

Matthew Prince, CEO of Cloudflare, commented on Friday on the cyberattack on the federal government that was exposed earlier this week.

Speaking on CNBC’s Mad Money, the cloud cybersecurity company’s CEO said it was one reason his company is moving to what he calls a “zero trust architecture” to isolate a breach.

“That effectively means when a hacker gets into part of your organization that includes them,” Prince told Jim Cramer. “It’s almost like a bulkhead in a ship, ensuring that a leak in one place doesn’t sink the entire ship.”

The hack, carried out by a nation-state believed to be Russia, gave actors access to several US government agencies, including the Treasury Department, Homeland Security and Commerce Departments, and the National Nuclear Security Administration. Outside of national government, state and local governments, as well as private entities, are believed to have been compromised or at risk, cyber experts say.

Computer security firm FireEye announced that the nifty attack the company was involved in sought information on its government customers. The company’s shares fell 13% after the incident was reported on Dec. 8, but the stock has since climbed to $ 19.23 from $ 13.49 after falling.

The hack alerted a large majority of Fortune 500 companies that there has been a “secret door” through which adversaries can access their networks since early 2020, Prince said.

Cloudflare’s zero trust system requires verification by every user attempting to access a network. This is used to prevent data hacking.

“There will be a lot of cleanup,” he added, “but I think the zero-trust architecture that Cloudflare is putting in place for our customers will, as we go along, help ensure that even if part of a company one Violates this architecture. ” It doesn’t sink the entire ship, and you can essentially make sure that even if the attacker got in through a door, they won’t get past that first room. “

Prince said that both the coronavirus pandemic and the regular occurrence of serious breaches are forcing companies to abandon their old security approaches to cloud-based cybersecurity strategies. He recognized the work that Cloudflare is doing with other security companies like Okta and Crowdstrike.

“By combining these best-of-breed solutions, these new cloud-based approaches, you get a better level of security and can offer every company the same state of the art [tools] that the googles of the world have, “he said.

Cloudflare’s shares were up 2.4% on Friday, trading at $ 83.81. The share has gained 391% since the beginning of the year.

CNBC’s Jim Cramer on Friday gave his assessment of XL Fleet, the electrification provider for commercial and municipal fleets, which is expected to go public next week via a blank check merger.

XL Fleet was founded in 2009 to open up the emerging economy for electric vehicles. The goal is a special purpose vehicle (SPAC) called Pivotal Investment, whose shares are undervalued, according to Cramer.

The stock was down 0.3% on Friday to close at $ 15.32 per share.

“Since Pivotal Investment is trading at $ 15 in the merger of the XL fleet, I think the stock could be a bargain,” said the Mad Money host. “But when it starts flying next week, please don’t try to chase it past $ 20.”

XL Fleet, which makes hybrid and plug-in hybrid powertrains, is the latest in a number of new entrants on SPACs, one of the hottest topics on Wall Street. SPACs were created specifically to raise funds, buy private companies, and go public.

The powertrains manufactured by the company are used to convert conventional gas-powered vehicles into hybrids on the assembly line. Their products are currently used in some Ford, GM and Isuzu fleet trucks.

The plug-in products that XL Fleet supplies for the Ford F-150 reduce CO2 emissions by 33%, according to the company.

XL Fleet plans an all-electric system by 2022. It’s going public in a year that sees a flurry of companies going public via SPAC deals, especially electric vehicle makers and related companies. The company is projected to generate revenue of $ 21 million this year, which is projected to increase to $ 647 million by 2023.

“What really sets XL Fleet apart, however, is that unlike most SPAC electric games, their products are already on the road,” said Cramer. “XL Fleet is a little different in that their short-term projections are much larger than what you can see from most of these SPAC names.”

Cramer is concerned about two headwinds the XL fleet is facing. This includes automakers planning to make their own all-electric models, which would reduce the need for XL Fleet powertrains. Ford has its own plans to launch electric models of the F-150 and Transit Van in 2022.

Cahs-stricken states and local governments are another headwind for the XL fleet, said Cramer, who fears the coronavirus pandemic could hurt spending on green transportation initiatives.

Meanwhile, the host believes the stock of Pivotal Investments, the acquiring company, offers a buying opportunity.

“I have to tell you, if XL Fleet is anywhere near its 2022 or 2023 projections, and we get clarity on this relationship with Ford and the F-150, this stock is cheap, damn cheap,” Cramer said. “XL Fleet would only trade 3.3 times its forecast for 2023.”

Disclosure: Cramer’s charitable foundation owns shares in Ford.

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Jay Leno said he thinks the genius of Tesla CEO Elon Musk was that “he built the infrastructure while he built the vehicle”.

“Even today, many major manufacturers build an electric car, but where do you charge it?” Leno told The News with Shepard Smith during a Friday night interview. “Elon was smart when he started, he knew this idea would work, so he built charging stations.”

Electric car maker Tesla will be the newest member of the S&P 500 on Monday.

2020 was a monster year for Tesla, the sixth largest company in the world – its inventory has grown by about 700% that year. CNBC’s “Jay Leno’s Garage” host said he was confident Tesla could maintain its dominance in electric vehicles, adding that he had seen European electric cars fall short.

“You don’t have the range of the Tesla,” Leno said. “They’re not doing it because Tesla is leading the field. We seem to have this inferiority complex that things in Europe are somehow better than the things that were built here.”

Leno gave host Shepard Smith examples of superior American innovation, including General Motors’ Corvette, which he believes rivals the Lamborghini and Ferrari and costs just $ 60,000.

He highlighted America’s dominance in private industry and pointed to Musk’s success in the space industry.

“The fact that Elon can send a rocket into space and land it back on earth for a tenth the price of the US government?” Said Leno. “Well, that’s exactly what the private sector should do – cheaper, faster, more efficiently.”

Leno suggested that those who want to feel the “rumble of a car beneath them” should “buy another car.” He admitted that he loves Ferraris, Ford Cobra and Lamborghinis on weekends, but that sitting in traffic and driving on the spot just isn’t practical.

“When you’re in a quiet electric vehicle, you don’t pollute and save,” Leno said. “When I want to have fun, I take out my 1960 Triumph TR3 and bomb around, but in terms of everyday vehicles you can’t beat it.” [the Tesla]. “

Rick Gates, senior vice president of pharmacy and healthcare at Walgreens, told CNBC that getting vaccines to the general public was “not a mess” as the FDA approved Moderna’s Covid-19 vaccine for emergency and plans got under way for the states to reach nearly 6 million doses by early next week.

“What you will see is that we will think very carefully about how we plan appointments, how we work with the communities we are in, in the states we are in, in priority populations to ensure that there won’t be long queues at pharmacy doors and that people will have safe, convenient and efficient ways to get vaccines, “said Gates.

Pfizer’s Covid-19 vaccine was launched in long-term care facilities on Friday, and Walgreens pharmacists gave many of those vaccinations. The federal government has agreements with Walgreens and other pharmacies, including CVS, to vaccinate millions of people across the country. In a Friday night interview with The News with Shepard Smith, Gates described how the organization’s pharmacists are trained to prepare them to effectively administer the Covid-19 vaccine.

“The safety protocol we gave our pharmacists to learn how to look for allergic reactions, how to make sure they monitor patients after vaccination, are all part of the normal process,” said Gates.

So far, according to publicly available data from 20 states, the United States has vaccinated at least 66,000 people, and that number is expected to increase dramatically as more states report their numbers. Gates acknowledged that there is a lot of organization involved in the vaccination process, but underlined that “Vaccines are what we do very consistently and that monitoring patients after a vaccine is a very common thing we do through flu shots, Shingrix or other vaccines think out there. “

Host Shepard Smith asked Gates how Walgreens would handle turning away people who come to their pharmacies to get vaccinated but are not part of a priority population. Gates said vaccines are planned in advance and not given a “walk-up” format like the flu shots. He added that Walgreens pharmacies across the country will be working with states and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention to ensure those in need of vaccines get them. Gates added that there would also be reminders for people to get their second dose.

“For the community. We’ll have all sorts of reminders and phone calls if we have to, to make sure Americans know they need that second dose and the right time for that dose,” Gates said.