FaZe Clan Gets Acquired By GameSquare

By Tit Krajnik

20 Oct 2023

Tit Krajnik 20 Oct 2023

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FaZe Clan has agreed on an acquisition by GameSquare
The deal comes due to FaZe’s financial struggles
GameSquare is the parent company of Complexity

GameSquare x FaZe Clan (credit: via gamesquare.com)

Due to financial struggles in the aftermath of the public listing disaster, FaZe Clan agreed on an acquisition by GameSquare, a Texas-based esports holding. The deal, which will be completed by the end of 2023, sees the FaZe Clan brand and all of its esports team transfer over to GameSquare, which could lead to potential issues with conflict of interest.

Due to the disastrous public listing, FaZe Clan found itself in huge financial problems, which led to the esports organisation agreeing on an acquisition by a Texas-based and NGL franchise Dallas Cowboys-backed esports holding, GameSquare.

The deal was announced on Friday, October 20, when the two companies outlined several changes within Faze Clan. Most notably, FaZe Clan founders Richard "Banks" Bengtson, Yousef "Apex" Abdelfattah and Thomas "Temperrr" Oliveira will all return to leading positions in the brand.

Banks will be the new FaZe Clan CEO
Temperrr will become the President of Faze Clan
Apex will be COO of FaZe Clan

Even though the deal will essentially save Faze Clan, it could lead to some problems as it sees FaZe Clan enter in a shared ownership with another esports organisation, Complexity, which is also owned by GameSquare.

Seeing Faze enter a shared ownership with another esports organisation, which competes in the same esports titles, namely Counter-Strike, could lead to potential conflict of interest issues, especially considering that both teams regularly compete in some of the biggest Counter-Strike events. That includes BLAST Premier and ESL tournaments.

The problem becomes more concerning, knowing that ESL does not allow one organisation to have multiple teams competing in the same tournament. Likewise, Valve has the same rules for Counter-Strike Majors and qualifying events – as stated in the official rulebook.

2.1 Teams and players should not have any financial interest in the success of any team that they are competing against. To participate in this tournament, players and teams are required to affirm that they have no conflict of interest (including any business entanglement such as shared management, shared ownership of entities, licensing, and loans) with any other participating team or its players.

How FaZe Clan and Complexity will resolve the issue remains to be seen, but considering the set rules, GameSquare will have to find a solution or force one of the two teams to shut down their CS divisions.