PGL eye North American expansion in 2018

In a wide-ranging interview with HLTV, the CEO of PGL, Silviu Stroie, fielded questions regarding the Minors and Majors that his company has run, the much-maligned WESA and PEA organizations, and more.

In regards to recent vocal opinions that online qualifiers for Majors are simply not cutting it anymore, Stroie said that he didn't know the solution but "it needs to be changed somehow".

Stroie also addressed the consolidation of tournament providers in the space, saying that PGL "are one of the very, very last independent companies". At a time when MTG (ESL, DreamHack, ESEA, WESA) and ESFORCE (EPICENTER) are responsible for many of the premier events on the tournament calendar, he certainly has a point. Here is a full excerpt on the subject:

The only thing I want to add is like I said, I really miss 2015, the period when there were a lot of tournament organizers out there. Going forward, the number of tournament organizers is going to decrease even more, we are going to see even more mergers, acquisitions, we are going to see several companies going bankrupt. A lot of the companies in esports right now aren't making money, including the industry leader, they have heavy losses since years and years, and they keep finding an investor after an investor, trying to build a monopoly over several games, and failing to do that.

Stroie also mentioned that PGL would be looking to "expand heavily" to Asia and North America in 2018, which would include building offices and studios in the regions. All of this, Stroie said, will be done with the goal of PGL becoming "the biggest independent, or neutral, esport company".