Star Horn Royal Club partners with Japanese eSports club Detonation FM

Yesterday, Chinese LPL club Star Horn (formerly Royal Club) announced via weibo that it has partnered with the Japanese eSports club Detonation FocusMe. From the weibo post:

#Official Announcement# Star Horn has confirmed today its friendly cooperative partnership with Detonation FM. In the near future, we two clubs will push forward together, and develop new avenues for profitable cooperation. We also hope that our clubs can each have their strengths and learn from each other to help both clubs develop faster and elevate the eSports industry.

Detonation FM’s League of Legends team shared a similar message on its official Twitter account.

Japan does have a professional League of Legends league, and while the level of play is not yet on par with the LPL, Detonation FM has consistently been one of its strongest teams.

So what’s the reason for the collaboration? It’s not likely that Star Horn is looking to pick up any of Detonation FM’s players just yet, although the Chinese club might be interested in sending prospects to its new sister club in Japan to give them some competitive experience before they’re good enough to make the Star Horn starting lineup. But it’s also possible that Star Horn’s new ownership is hoping to share organizational information with the Japanese club, which also has teams for other games (primarily Counter-Strike) and which is working to develop the LOL scene in a very different gaming environment.

Whatever the reason, though, it’s great to see Asian eSports teams working together like this to elevate the eSports scene as a whole. And it’s also probably a great sign for the Japanese League of Legends scene, which also got some good news this spring with the announcement of the establishment of Riot Games Japan.