Riot Games Announced Partnership with Cisco
Riot Games and Cisco announced their partnership. This will be a multi-year partnership that establishes the global technology leader as the Official Enterprise Networking Partner of League of Legends Esports.
Cisco’s networking solutions will power “The Realm” – the private game server used exclusively for pro-level competitive LoL Esports matches at three major global events: The League of Legends World Championship, The Mid-Season Invitational, and The All-Star Event. Cisco’s highly secure, flexible, and reliable networking technology will serve as the foundation to deliver the world’s most popular e-sport as it moves into its second decade.
Esports Tech Lead of Riot Games Scott Adametz said: “As a sport completely reliant on technology, it is essential that League of Legends runs on a trusted and reliable network. With Cisco as a partner, we now are able to build and expand the infrastructure necessary to deliver the best esports experience possible for fans and professional players all over the world.”.
Riot Games Partners with Cisco
Brian Eaton, Cisco Director of Global Sports Marketing said: “Our partnership with Riot Games brings together the leaders in esports and networking to offer the best possible connected experience for the players and millions of fans around the world. Cisco is committed to redesigning the internet for the future, and esports has a big impact on that goal. With more people online than ever before for work and entertainment, it is critical to have a highly secure, flexible infrastructure in place to help ensure the visual quality and speed that will be required in the future.”.
The Realm – Competitive Esports Server Upgrade
League of Legends is an e-sport that requires quick strategic planning and fast reaction timing. For pro players, it is essential to be able to face the least amount of lag (or “ping”) as possible. With Cisco technology being implemented in “The Realm,” Riot and Cisco are together working to help pro players compete on Summoner’s Rift at sub-1ms ping, allowing for near-instantaneous reaction times and uninterrupted gameplay. The new Cisco servers are expected to offer up to 200% raw performance improvement over the previous technology.
Global Esports Networking
In order to power the next decade of esports, Riot Esports will deploy a new collaborative global infrastructure and networking upgrades. Cisco’s global and regional footprint allows Riot the flexibility, accessibility, and security needed to produce world-class esports events in all corners of the globe. Using Cisco’s advanced networking technology, fans at home will be able to watch LoL Esports broadcast streams with reduced delay and improved quality, bringing them closer to the action.
Regional Broadcast Center Upgrades
As part of a global initiative to standardize and promote competitive integrity around the world, Riot Games will deploy more than 200 new tournament game servers in regional studios all centrally managed through Cisco’s new Intersight SaaS solution. Using Cisco’s UCS B-Series Blade Servers, C-Series Rack Servers, and Nexus 9000 Series Switches, Riot Games will establish a common infrastructure footprint across the 12 RBCs including virtualization, storage, and computing to deliver improved performance with reduced latency for regional professional gameplay. Cisco blade nodes can easily adapt and support the broadcast centres without the need for new hardware, allowing for potential new e-sport applications to come online with ease.
Global Riot Object Storage
As a worldwide leader in esports, Riot Games will undergo a major, global expansion of their object storage system to support content distribution, media processing, and global content archive. Using Cisco’s Storage Optimized Computing Solutions, Riot will build an archive to protect their legacy of content that will more than triple the amount of usable storage and capacity.
Press Release
