Officials from Danish E-sports and professional gaming company Regroup Esports have announced the acquisition of Xbox Users Group (XUG), the world’s second largest Xbox 360 community, as a part of wider move into the U.S. games market.
XUG began in 2001 on MSN Communities and received a Webby award in 2003, before becoming a community member at official website Xbox.com. The site was named as one of the “Friends of Xbox” in 2005, and in January of this year founder Cornelis van den Bosch was awarded Microsoft’s MVP (Most Valuable Professional) award for 2006-2007. The site currently has over 45,000 registered users.
Although Regroup Esports already has extensive experience in the PC market, with subsidiaries in China and Germany, this is the company’s first major move into the console market and part of an attempted new expansion in the North American market. Financial details of the acquisition were not disclosed.
“By purchasing XUG we hope to gradually bring together two separate gaming worlds – being respectively the world of consoles and the world of e-sports. We believe that such a mix will become useful and exciting to both gamer segments. In addition to this, the purchase is very attractive for us since 60% of all users of the XUG are from the States – an area we’re very interested in getting to know better,” said CEO Mark Peter Fries.
“A site like Xbox Users Group can only grow to a certain height as for a hobby and fan site. When Xbox Users Group over the years became this insane hobby, days, nights and weekends were spent to build up the site as it is today. But with the help of Regroup Esports, a giant in the gaming industry, XUG will in the future become much more than just a fan site. I’m looking much forward to this very interesting co-operation,” said future community director Cornelis van den Bosch.
