Paul-Bernard Bakare
The Nexal Gaming Company (NGC) evolved from being a small group of dedicated gamers to becoming a competent organization, managing multiple programs. It has stayed true to its initial vision of impacting and adding value to the Nigerian gaming and Esports industry while expanding from a small community of gamers to a well-organized firm.
NGC initiated as a community platform for Nigerian gamers in September 2019, providing a platform for interactions, networking, and updates on Nigerian gaming and Esports. In July 2021, we transformed into the Nexal Gaming Community to meet gamers’ informational, financial, and networking needs in Nigeria and across Africa. NGC then transitioned from being just a gaming community into the Nexal Gaming Company in October 2023, managing a diverse set of gaming companies, aiming to serve the gaming and Esports industry on a wider scale, while retaining the ‘NGC’ title.
The journey of our growth and survival in this sector has been astonishing. From being just a simple ecosystem aggregator to a gaming community having over 100,000 members and now a fully structured Esports firm looking for seed funding, it requires a lot of effort to manage this level of progress. A significant part of this success is due to a highly skilled team, passionate about gaming and esports growth in Nigeria and Africa.
As a unique gaming and esports firm, our prime focus is on providing value to the gamers, gaming communities, and ecosystem operators in the Nigerian and African esports industry. We have proposed several projects at many hackathons and pitch events. Our portfolio includes The NGC, which handles news articles, communities, data reports services, tournament organizations, consultation services, marketing programs. We also have ‘Esports NG’ our networking platform, ‘Nexal Esports’ our official esports team, ‘Clutch Africa’ our esports merch and apparel corporation, ‘Nexus Hub’ for gaming lounges around Africa and ‘African Esports Podcast’ (AEP) to deliver entertaining esports contents and discussions.
However, our standout project is the Esports NG platform which is set to launch in January 2024 as one of Africa’s largest social gaming platforms. Esports NG is a platform that provides visibility for gamers and gaming teams to showcase their successes in the African gaming industry, considering that over 55% of gaming and Esports monetization is tied to sponsorships and advertising.
Despite attempts from competitors, we found that existing platforms often overlook gaming communities and ecosystem operators in their strategic plans. As a result, the gaming scene will likely remain stagnant unless larger players start considering including smaller esports communities in their programs. Our strategy is to collaborate with smaller gaming communities with unique specializations and create quality digital and physical experiences (esports events) at scale.
At the moment, the company is one seed funding away from creating major disruptions in the Esports ecosystem, a feat we believe can be achieved before 2024.
The success we’ve enjoyed so far wouldn’t have been possible without our current and former sponsors and partners, which include Cxmmunity Media, Carry1st, Africa Comicade, Monster Energy, the African Esports Rankings. We aim to focus on supporting other players like us in the future, drive esports adoption at the grassroots level, create digital and physical esports events, while continually working on the projects in our esports portfolio.
We are confident that the best is yet to come.
Our mantra for the NGC is to ‘Play Life like a Game’ and ‘Play it Well’.
Paul-Bernard Bakare is the CTO of Nexal Gaming Company