On January 11, before the 2023 season of League of Legends e-sports competition, Li Ning, a Chinese sports brand, reached a strategic cooperation with League of Legends Professional League (LPL).
In the new season, Li Ning brand has become a strategic partner of League of Legends professional league, an official sports Category Partner of League of Legends professional league and an official licensor of League of Legends sportswear accessories, provide League of Legends professional e-sports players with professional gaming sports equipment with more Chinese cultural heritage.
With the official appearance of the new team uniforms of 17 clubs, Li Ning officially replaced Nike and became the only official competition partner of LPL in sportswear jewelry category in the next four years.
As an emerging professional sports competition, the professional sports competition spirit of “fearless competition peak” of League of Legends professional league coincides with the sports gene of Li Ning brand. This strategic cooperation will also become another important strategic layout of Li Ning Company in the field of sports.
According to the cooperation reached this time, the two sides will, in the next four years, adopt the four major strategies of sports operation, product theme localization, IP linkage and diversification of user experience, jointly promote the development of professional sports events in League of Legends professional league.
Becoming a partner of LPL Alliance this time can be regarded as an important move for Li Ning to further lay out the e-sports layout. This will also help Li Ning and LPL to establish a mature professional sports competition league system, provide a professional growth platform for e-sports players, and jointly build a professional sports health management system, continue to pay attention to the physical and mental health of professional players and prolong their career.
In addition to the significance and value of the business level, in the cultural level, there will be more stories to tell.
From Nike to Li Ning, what do the audience think?
In the microblog comment area where LPL official Xuan cooperated with Li Ning, “unilaterally announce that IG Club’s uniform is the champion!” Wait until it becomes a praise comment.
In terms of cultural background, Li Ning, as a professional sports brand growing up in China, is more likely to resonate with audiences-On the one hand, young people’s love for Chinese goods and Chinese culture has increased day by day in recent years, on the other hand, for the deconstruction of e-sports culture, Li Ning also seems to be more attentive than international brands, which also illustrates the importance of cultural differences to sports equipment marketing activities.
All these prompted the audience to vote for Li Ning in the aesthetic level.
“Li Ning’s achievements in professional sports and sports trends are obvious to all in recent years, and Li Ning itself has always been very popular in the field of sportswear and sneakers. As an e-sports audience, we also hope that the sports equipment enterprises of traditional sports can bring this culture to e-sports, making the competitive atmosphere of e-sports stronger and the sense of ceremony stronger.” This is what the senior audience of e-sports said on the 9th.
And the expression of another audience we interviewed was more direct: “When will it be put on the shelves? Urgent.”
The audience’s reaction probably shows Li Ning’s popularity.
But this kind of “popularity” is not a one-day achievement.
Let young people fall in love with Chinese culture
The reaction of young people has something to do with the brand image established by Li Ning in recent years.
As a professional sports brand, Li Ning has long focused on the field of professional sports. It is not only the first domestic sports brand to sponsor the Chinese sports delegation of the Asian Games and the Chinese sports delegation of the Olympic Games, it is also the longest-term partner of CBA, China’s top basketball professional league. Since its establishment in 1990, the brand’s professional sports image has been continuously consolidated. In 2018, Li Ning first appeared in New York Fashion Week and Paris Fashion Week, which made both Chinese and the world see the power of Chinese sports trends.
In Li Ning’s development process, besides retaining the sports genes of traditional sports and implementing the brand spirit of “everything is possible”, Li Ning has quietly completed the sublimation and enrichment of the brand in recent years, integrating the elements of “sports trend”-this made Li Ning find a new way of brand renewal, and also made the younger generation have a strong favorable impression on this domestic brand.
Over the years, Li Ning Company has launched a long-term strategic layout around basketball, running, fitness, badminton, table tennis and other professional sports, and has developed and grown together with China’s sports industry.
It is precisely because it has always been a strong binding relationship with china’s sports industry that li ning is constantly exploring a new way to spread chinese culture.
E-sports is also one of the new roads.
LPL is the highest-level e-sports event of League of Legends in mainland China. Over the years, LPL’s team has not only been very popular in China, but also has been playing LPL in the world, even add luster to China’s e-sports. It is precisely because of many good results that LPL’s club’s influence at home and abroad has risen.
Li Ning, as a domestic brand that has always maintained communication with young people, holding hands with LPL will further improve its brand goodwill among young people. In this process, Li Ning will also integrate more elements related to the connotation of Chinese culture into the products related to e-sports. E-sports will also become the carrier of Chinese culture, moving towards young people and the world.
With Li Ning’s own professional sports and sports trend resources, Li Ning will also help LPL and e-sports industry in the dimension of user communication, it can even provide more popular games and interactive forms for e-sports enthusiasts such as e-sports trend show.
It is reported that in addition to the cooperation of Hero League events in this strategic cooperation, Li Ning brand has also reached a tripartite cooperation with Teng competitive sports and fist games. Li Ning brand will combine Teng competitive sports and fist games to provide more diverse product categories; Integrate online and offline channels and communication resources, it brings brand-new experience and product experience to users and game players of League of Legends e-sports, creates a more diversified atmosphere for watching games, and helps the development of competition IP and game IP.
How to build professional gaming equipment for sports brands
Although e-sports has been recognized as an official sport since 2003, it really regards e-sports as sports, it is a trend that has just begun in recent years to build e-sports equipment suitable for e-sports players.
Li Ning is naturally one of the trendsetter.
As a brand that has always been committed to providing professional product experience and sports experience for consumers and athletes, Li Ning has brought brand-new products and equipment for the electric campaign hand strap. From the perspective of Chinese e-sports culture and the needs of players, Li Ning gave different answers on the road of “exploring professional equipment specialized in serving Electronic Competitive Sports.
With the theme of “Wu as the competition peak”, Li Ning brand draws inspiration from Chinese traditional costumes and maintains close communication with various clubs to tap the characteristics of the team and the city culture, integrating team spirit and cultural core, it has created professional gaming exclusive products for 17 clubs of League of Legends professional league in the new season. The Chinese-style uniform design explains the unique Chinese cultural stories of different teams and shows a brand new look of the league.
“On sword and Silver Dragon, Wu is the peak of competition” has become the secret code for e-sports enthusiasts to meet. The topic of “LPL puts Chinese style on the body” once aroused heated discussion among netizens.
This heated discussion also illustrates Li Ning’s intention to the product from another angle.
It is reported that in the process of product design, Li Ning brand designer watched and analyzed the actual game videos for more than 500 hours, went deep into the e-sports base and lived together with the players, in order to better observe and experience the function and professional needs of e-sports players for sportswear.
Through deep exploration of the characteristics of electronic competitive sports, designers drew inspiration from the treasure house of traditional collar and sleeve types in ancient China, and drew inspiration for the style of shoes and clothing products, materials and Technology have been optimized and upgraded in an all-round way. It not only creates an exclusive version for e-sports events, but also gives a larger space for activities aiming at the shoulder, elbow and cuff positions of the coat. It also focuses on adjusting necessary functions such as comfort, ventilation and sweat absorption.
After long-term sitting, e-sports players will become congested and swollen due to a large amount of blood flowing to their calves and feet. Therefore, this season, Li Ning brand has created a brand-new Yunyou Orca shoe for this sports feature. The upper is designed with all seamless weaving materials to enhance the sense of product wrapping, which can keep comfortable even when the feet are swollen. At the same time, the cloud tour Orca is made of full-Palm BOOM material, which is comfortable and shock-absorbing, relieves foot pressure, and helps players to present a better competitive state.
Conclusion —
— “does Li Ning e-sports club have an age limit on players? I think I should have time to practice now ”
–” LOL,ANYTHING IS POSSIBLE. ”
This is the interaction between Li Ning, the founder of Li Ning brand, and the predecessor of LNG team called Snake at that time on Weibo in May, 2019.
It’s a snake and a thousand miles. Now looking at this interaction, we can feel Li Ning’s determination to “help China’s e-sports development with 30 years of determination to support China’s sports industry.
With Li Ning’s further participation in the development of e-sports industry, its influence on e-sports industry and e-sports culture is immeasurable.
Working with LPL today may also lay a new foreshadowing for further development.
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