Samsung and Twitch just inked a mobile gaming deal around Twitch Rivals North America, the esports competition made for Twitch streamers.
As part of the year-long partnership, Samsung Galaxy will host mobile gaming challenges and events, starting with a live Twitch Rivals broadcast on January 13.
The next activation in the pipeline is a Twitch Rivals Mobile Challenge, a mobile gaming series of crossover events for Twitch users featuring top streamers and mobile game franchises.
In addition, companies will host ‘Mobile Mondays’, a tournament series with cash prizes and other benefits for Galaxy and Twitch users.
Later this year, Twitch Rivals and Samsung will debut ‘Mobile Gaming Heroes’, who will create original content, host exclusive streams and participate in select events.
The news follows Twitch’s record-breaking month of December, when it saw 1.7 billion hours watched, according to a new report from StreamElements and Arsenal.gg. Comparatively, Facebook Gaming ended 2020 with 388 million hours watched. Though that’s way less than Twitch, it’s worth noting that Facebook Gaming’s yearly watch time ballooned by 166 percent–from 1.35 billion hours in 2019 to 3.59 billion hours in 2020, as per StreamElements and Arsenal.gg.
Like Samsung, Verizon is also betting big on esports. In August, it announced a sponsorship deal that makes it the official 5G and 4G LTE network partner of Twitch Rivals, which in 2020 alone hosted over 100 events. In a press release, Verizon wrote, “Together, Verizon and Twitch will collaborate on media and broadcast integrations in Twitch Rivals streams, activations at Twitch events, and innovate together using the power of Verizon’s 5G Ultra Wideband network, 5G built for gamers.”
