THE Saudi Arabian Federation for Electronic & Intellectual Sports (SAFEIS) is teaming up with Shawarmer restaurants to sponsor a yearlong series of electronic gaming events and competitions covering more than 15 events in 14 cities

Shawarmer, one of the Saudi’s most popular and fastest growing locally owned and operated restaurant companies, will serve as the exclusive food service partner for what will be Saudi’s largest gaming series that is expected to attract more than 20,000 competitors and 150,000 eSports fans. The series will feature such popular games as Baloot, Trix, Kenkan, Tekken, FiFa and Fortnite with gamers competing for prizes worth as much as SR1,000,000.

“Electronic gaming and eSports are an important part of a growing national entertainment sector. With such an enthusiastic gaming fan base among the large Saudi youth population, we want to bring to them best-in-class events and experiences to share their love of this new class of sport with an opportunity to compete against top talent across the nation,” said Prince Faisal Bin Bandar Sultan, President of SAFEIS. “We are pleased to have popular homegrown Saudi brands like Shawarmer step up to support our national efforts to help create new entertainment experiences for our young people.”

“With this new event series, SAFEIS is partnering with some of the most advanced technology and gaming companies in the world to help Saudi lead the region in competitive eSports events and entertainment. We know so many of our customers are huge gaming fans and sponsoring this series helps gives them an opportunity to show off their skills as well as compete for large cash prizes,” said Faisal Alrasheed, marketing director of Shawarmer.

Electronic gaming and eSports are more than just a highly popular entertainment option. It’s an important economic development pillar of the Saudi entertainment sector. More and larger gaming cafes and eSports venues are opening in cities across the nation, giving Saudi gamers the chance to get recruited into and join international events. In 2016-2017-2018, a Saudi gamer won the FIFA eWorld Grand Cup Final, an event featuring more than 20 million gamers worldwide with a prize of $250,000. SAFEIS streamed the event live in Saudi through partnership with a series of leading technology companies.

“We want to help grow the recognition and legitimacy of electronic gaming and eSports as more than just entertainment. It’s a growing competitive sport on a global scale with a pathway for participants to join from anywhere in the world and it represents a very large economic development opportunity for us as a nation,” said Prince Faisal.

“Our focus for SAFEIS is to help explore and expand the entirety of the electronic gaming sector by opening new ways to both participate and benefit from it.”

As the exclusive food service partner, Shawarmer will use all the marketing platforms to announce all the activities matters and promote the Saudi Arabian federation and Electronic and intellectual sports while providing the logistics support. — SG