Skillz Launches $100,000 eSports Tournament

Leading Mobile eSports Platform Powers World’s Largest Solitaire Competition

SAN FRANCISCO, Aug. 8, 2018 – Skillz, the worldwide leader in mobile eSports, announced today the largest solitaire tournament in history. The event, which kicks off on August 9 in Solitaire Cube by Tether Studios, will feature a $100,000 prize pool. The company expects over 40,000 competitors to participate, with first place taking home $10,000.

“The popularity of solitaire made it a natural fit for Skillz, a platform that makes eSports accessible to everyone,” said Tim O’Neil, CEO of Tether Studios. “When we built Solitaire Cube, we never imagined we would one day host the largest competition in the most popular game of all time.”

Solitaire, also known as ‘patience,’ is one of the most popular video games in history. Microsoft’s Windows Solitaire was a 2017 finalist for the World Video Game Hall of Fame, with over 100 million unique players. Mobile versions of solitaire have been even more popular, with over 17 million people playing solitaire games every day according to data from App Annie. That makes solitaire more than 7 times as popular as the hit game Fortnite, which has 2.4 million daily active mobile players according to App Annie.

The upcoming Skillz event will not only be solitaire’s largest tournament by total prizes, but will also be among the eSports industry’s most inclusive with the top 1,000 players earning a piece of the prize pool. The unequal distribution of eSports prizes recently garnered industry attention when the winner of EVO’s Super Smash Bros. Melee competition redistributed his earnings to lower finishers in protest of the event’s prize splits.

“In keeping with our mission, we designed this event to be accessible to everyone,” said Andrew Paradise, CEO and founder of Skillz. “Only 24 teams had the opportunity to win prizes in the League of Legends World Championship, but for a game like solitaire with billions of players, the tournament structure needs to be more inclusive.”

Solitaire Cube is available for download on both iOS and Android devices. For more information on Skillz-enabled games and implementing mobile eSports competitions, visit www.skillz.com or email [email protected].

About Skillz
Skillz, the leading mobile eSports platform, connects the world’s 2.6 billion mobile gamers through competition. In 2017, Skillz was named the #1 fastest-growing private company in America by Inc. Magazine, the first eSports company on CNBC’s Disruptor 50, and the only eSports company on the San Francisco Business Times Fast 100. Over 15 million gamers use Skillz to compete in mobile games across 8,000+ game studios. Founded in 2012, Skillz is headquartered in San Francisco and backed by leading venture capitalists as well as the owners of the New England Patriots, Milwaukee Bucks, New York Mets and Sacramento Kings. To learn more, visit www.skillz.com.

Press Contact
Roxie Bostwick
Communications Lead
Skillz Inc.
[email protected]