Esports Company TSM Raises $37 Million, Investors Include Stephen Curry, Steve Young
Matt Perez
Matt Perez Former Staff
Andy Dinh, the 26-year-old founder and CEO of the esports organization TSM, has always been fiercely self-reliant. Since TSM’s founding in 2009, Dinh has worn just about every hat there is in the industry: player, coach, manager, salesman, public relations. But now he's getting help in a big way.
On Tuesday, TSM’s parent company, Swift, announced it received $37 million in Series A funding. Ethan Kurzweil of Bessemer Venture Partners leads a group of investors that include three-time NBA champion Stephen Curry and AME Cloud Ventures, a fund started by Yahoo cofounder and billionaire Jerry Yang. The investment also covers Swift’s other business segments, including its influencer content network and its analytic web services like FortniteMaster and ProBuilds.
Dinh, who remains the majority owner and head of the company, started TSM when he was 17 years old using the cash he earned from offering online guides for League of Legends. Wanting to compete in the game, he built a team and put on invitational tournaments of his own. In 2013, as esports became more formalized and the League of Legends creator began running its own official league, Dinh stepped down as a player to focus more on management. His ability to monetize the organization as it began winning championships at sold-out arenas like the Scotiabank Arena in Toronto nabbed him a spot on Forbes’ 30 Under 30 in Games 2017 list.
The investment is a move long delayed but necessary given the rapid evolution of esports. Last year, when the creators of League of Legends announced its groundbreaking plans to franchise its North American league, it was clear that TSM would be among the initial ten permanent teams. Dinh’s club is the winningest in the region with six championships. But as other esports teams raised venture capital to cover the $10 million buy-in, accepted buyouts or were pushed out by billionaire owners looking to get in on the ground floor of the burgeoning industry, it also became clear Dinh would be the last old-school owner in the league to be independent.
“TSM has always run a very lean operation, so we haven’t set ourselves up to take advantage of the fast growth that this market is experiencing, so that’s what we’re trying to prepare ourselves to do,” Dinh told Forbes. “We’ve got a really good group of investors … it’s going to help us accomplish what we want for TSM.”