00Nation purchases 13.5% stake in Guild
As first publicized by Esports Insider, 00 Nation has been revealed as the "unnamed esports brand" that invested in GUILD back in October 2023. At the time, the British organization backed by David Beckham declined to disclose the identity of the investment which totaled around £1m.
The reveal of 00Nation's identity comes as a result of mandatory disclosure requirements under British law that compel publicly traded companies to disclose when anybody takes a significant stake in a company. On January 31st, Guild released a notice that 00Nation had purchased 100,000,000 voting shares of the company, a stake equivalent to 13.54% of the voting rights of Guild Esports.
The UK organization Guild Esports has recently expanded its reach into Counter-Strike by signing the Kosovar Bad News Eagles team just over two months ago, expanding their portfolio alongside their ESL Impact Guild fe lineup.
00Nation currently holds a Counter-Strike team of its own and recently competed in the PGL CS2 Major Copenhagen 2024 Europe RMR Open Qualifiers. Despite placing in the top sixteen of two of those qualifiers, the team failed to qualify for the Closed Qualifiers. The team has not played since January 16th and has no upcoming matches.
This purchase arises questions about conflict of interest. Organizations are usually prevented from fielding two rosters in events that those teams could potentially play one another. Valve has previously ruled to prevent conflicts of interest based on players or coaches owning stakes in multiple teams and Immortals Gaming Club, owners of MIBR, having official buyout clauses with Yeah Gaming, both fielding rosters at the time.
Because 00Nation and Guild Eagles often play in the lower tiers of the European Counter-Strike circuit, they would likely compete in the same tournaments. Both recently competed in YaLLa Compass Fall 2023 and CCT Online Finals 4.
It is unknown how 00 Nation and Guild Eagles will work together in regards to the potential conflict of interest in regards to their Counter-Strike divisions given the significant shared investment.
