NEW YORK, May 19, 2017 /PRNewswire/ -- Ted Owen, the
father of E-sports, has recently launched PlayAPI. He was the first
mover in the multi-billion-dollar industry of E-sports through one
of his first groundbreaking companies, Global Gaming League,
launched in 1999. He states that PlayAPI, a company based on
aggregating data across platforms and publishers, is just as
innovative and, in his words, "likely to be far more successful"
than the multi-billion-dollar industry he is already responsible
for launching. In fact, it was during his time as CEO of
GGL that he really made a name for himself in the video gaming
industry.
"Mr. Ted Owen is a Co-Founder
of Global Gaming League and serves as its Chairman and Chief
Executive Officer. Mr. Owen is a pioneer of the video gaming
industry. His founding of Professional Interactive Entertainment
Inc. in 2002, was the culmination of a lifelong fascination. Mr.
Owen's participation in the industry evolved from youthful
recreational devotion at the very inception of video games to
all-out professional passion," according to Bloomberg.com.
Owen's background in video games is extensive. In fact, he
studied and launched several innovative companies in the video
gaming industry between 1993 and 2017, with his latest project,
PlayAPI. After graduating from Duke
University, he started an investment banking company named
Owen, Diaz and Altschul based in NYC, which focused on investing in
early stage video game companies such as Spectrum Holobyte and
3-DO as well as numerous other successful video gaming
companies. Deciding that he wanted to build something rather than
what he called "shuffling paper around," he left Owen, Diaz
and Altschul and co-wrote the business plan for UGO. UGO was the
first company of its type to allow the public rather than the
professionals to write reviews on video games. Mr. Owen was the
first to write public reviews of such notable games such as GTA,
Max Payne, and Command and
Conquer.
It was at this time, after the sale of UGO, Owen and his
co-partner, Jason Carlton, conceived
of the concept that video gaming would one day become a sport. GGL
was the culmination of that vision, and Mr. Owen, through GGL, was
the first to not only take video games to the Beijing Olympics in
China as an exhibition sport, but
also sign contracts with MTV, TNT and the Gravity
games, the precursor to the X Games. He also is notable
for his innovations such as the Hip-Hop Gaming League, which
featured hip hop stars at the time competing in leagues and filmed
for MTV. That was in 2006, and included Snoop Dogg and Method Man
to name a few, whereas today you can turn on the TV to see that
this was a decade ahead of its time. In fact, his bringing video
gaming as an exhibition sport to the Beijing Olympics paved the way
for video gaming to become a medal sport in the 2020 Olympic games.
Ted Owen's cousin, Jake Burton, the founder of snowboards, was also
responsible for snowboarding becoming an Olympic sport. It seems
that visionaries run in the family.
Ted has consulted for the Yucaipa Companies, advising them for
how to best invest in the video gaming industry, as well as
consulting to investors, companies and individuals in the digital
media space.
Ted Owen's partner, Jason Carlton, is a lifelong gamer and
evangelist of online gaming. He is a former professional quake
player and founder of Death Row, the first globally recognized
E-sports team. It was there that he met Ted
Owen, and together they came up with the concept of the
first major E-sports league and social network for video gaming, in
the U.S that ran for 14 years.
Ted's other partner in PlayAPI, Jose Luis Coriolo, goes way
back, having first met when Owen became involved in the world of
investment banking, developing both a professional and personal
relationship over time. They knew a long time ago that if their
particular skills were combined, great things would eventually
happen. The founding of PlayAPI is the result of this. In fact,
Jose Coriolo's background is with Citigroup, where he focused
particularly on new technology.
"To have a global financial leader such as Citi select NYSE
Technologies' managed service is a tremendous validation of DART's
value and utility in today's data-intensive environment. Our
approach is to help customers reduce their costs, and increase
their efficiency, by managing market data in smarter, more
effective ways. DART offers a complete range of global,
exchange-agnostic tools and services that address most aspects of a
firm's administration of market data," according to
banking-business-review.com.
Finally, Mr. Owen was named a top 20 entrepreneur by Stuff
Magazine and included in Maxim Magazine's list of 10 individuals
changing the world in digital media. Play API looks like a success
in the making, and it seems Mr. Owen is again an entrepreneur and
individual to watch in 2017. Mr. Owen has come a long way since his
attempt to be a top tennis star and has had a huge influence on the
largest entertainment form in the world, video gaming, having
created what is now the largest sport in the world, video gaming,
and having predicted it way before anybody gave it any
credibility.
Contact: Chris Hinman Phone: 786-332-6230
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SOURCE Ted Owen