Vindex Joins Envy, Andbox To Plan Gaming Centers In Dallas, NYC

Vindex announced the purchase of Belong Gaming on Wednesday and plans to spend $300 million over the next five years to open 1,000 esports gaming centers around the world, according to Esports Observer. Belong will partner with esports conglomerates Envy and Andbox to open locations in the Dallas and New York City areas respectively.

Belong, which already operates 24 gaming arena locations across the United Kingdom, was valued in the acquisition at about $50 million, per the Financial Times. Belong will provide the logistical operations in getting these gaming centers off the ground, and Envy and Andbox will bring events, marketing and pro gamers from the different esports teams they own to bring programming and awareness to help centralize the local gaming scenes in their home markets. 

Each flagship location in Dallas and New York will provide 100 PCs and consoles for parties, events, school outings, clubs and local esports tournaments. Obviously given the coronavirus pandemic, the timing for when these locations will open is yet unknown.

“The Dallas-Forth Worth market has been, at least until this year, very event, team and competition focused as an entertainment source,” said Geoff Moore, Envy Gaming’s president and COO. “So we’re very happy to have such high class experienced operators who understand esports to partner with us as we build out the entire esports ecosystem.”

Envy, which owns the Overwatch League’s Dallas Fuel, the Call of Duty League’s Dallas Empire and Team Envy, which competes and streams in everything from Call of Duty and Overwatch to CS:GO, Rocket League, Super Smash Bros and Valorant, is still working on developing its home market from North Texas up to Oklahoma and down to Waco. And working with Vindex and Belong will help Envy expand its grassroots level outreach from large scale events like OWL homestands to smaller, more localized organized activities.

“Here, there are hundreds of thousands of people playing all these different games, but they’re all doing it individually from their homes and they’re linked together through their headphones and the internet,” Moore said. “But what’s been the missing part of that vertical stack is the venues that allow them to scale and come together for events or participatory entertainment. It’s just a big piece of the puzzle that gets filled in.”

Moore said that within two years, he expects between eight and 12 gaming centers to be operational in the Metroplex. These locations, Moore hopes, will host hold corporate events, birthday parties, camps, clinics, academies and school and professional tournaments.

“The schools in Texas are now increasingly developing esports clubs,” he said, “and helping them is a big part of this as well.”

Andbox, which owns the Overwatch League’s New York Excelsior, Call of Duty League’s New York Subliners and streamers and content creators across numerous games, said that the NYC esports community has long been underserved.

“These new gaming centers we’ll be launching in partnership with Vindex will provide a high quality, best in class experience that esports fans in the New York metro area deserve,” Farzam Kamel, Andbox’s president and co-founder said in a statement. “One of Andbox’s goals has always been to provide the local community here with physical spaces specifically designed for and dedicated to gaming, and we couldn’t be more excited to be a part of making that a reality.”

With the coronavirus pandemic greatly impacting the economy, now is actually a great time, Moore said, for Vindex and Belong to expand.

“There’s never been a better time to have your real estate advisor go out and look for rental deals on existing retail spaces,” he said. “There are great deals to be had in great locations right now.”

Whenever Vindex can have these sites operational and when it’s safe to do so, Envy and Andbox will be ready with their teams and streamers who are constantly putting out content to help launch these gaming centers when things get back to normal in the U.S.

“Just because this period is happening right now,” Moore said, “doesn’t mean there’s not a lot of effort and work going on below the surface to get ready and take advantage of the pent up demand for entertainment and events that will occur once the public health situation improves dramatically.”