The Budget 2019 which was just announced has some pretty good news, especially for gamers; there’s the welcome news that the government has allocated RM10 million for the Malaysian e-sports scene.
It doesn’t come as a huge surprise as Malaysia is gaining ground in the e-sports scene with a major US$1 million Dota 2 tournament being held right in KL this month.
The RM10 million allocation for e-sports that goes to the Malaysia Digital Economy Corp (MDEC) under Budget 2019 will give Malaysia the opportunity to nurture new talents to become champions in e-sports and aid in the creation of games for the world market, its chief executive officer Datuk Yasmin Mahmood said.
She also added that this would be a good time to invest into e-sports as the games industry is worth USD180.1 billion, and e-sports is a growing part of the ecosystem.
Furthermore, e-sports will also be included in the 2022 Asian Games as a full-medal event. The International Olympic Committee is also considering to include e-sports in the 2024 Olympics which will be held in France.
The allocation has also attracted the attention of Razer’s CEO, Min-Liang Tan who replied to our Youth and Sports Minister, Syed Saddiq’s tweet about the allocation for e-sports.
He pledged to also invest RM10 million into the Malaysian e-sports scene to bring it to the next level.
To cap it all off Syed Saddiq thanked him for the support and Min-Liang Tan responded in the best way: with a GIF of a fist-bump.
Local e-sports startup Kitamen have pledged RM100,000 of their own, in response to the tweets.
Many netizen did react positively to the annoucements, imagining what it could mean for the future. However, most wanted to know more about about how it would be implemented and distributed.
So let’s hope that the Malaysian e-sports scene will see a bigger boom in 2019 with the help of MDEC and Razer and other local players working hand-in-hand.
E-sports is already widely seen as a legitimate career, and the industry is clearly growing year after year. It’s an exciting time to be an e-sports fan in Malaysia, and we’re going to be looking very closely at how this potential combined RM20 million investment into the scene will be spent and distributed.
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Feature Image Credit: @minliangtan Twitter/ Syed Saddiq Syed Abdul Rahman Facebook