At the 2016 IAB Digital Content NewFronts inside the PlayStation Theater in Times Square, Activision Blizzard Media Networks (ABMN) senior vice president Mike Sepso showcased the MLG.tv Enhanced Viewing Experience (EVE), which was tested at the recent CS:GO Major in Columbus Ohio. The technology is a high-definition video stream with a built-in algorithmic system that provides viewers with match statistics, up-to-the-minute leaderboards and situational insights based on the competition they are watching. It’s the first time this technology is being demonstrated to advertisers in New York City.

Also new for ABMN is a daily ESR broadcast on MLG.tv by veteran broadcaster and retired professional gamer Chris Puckett, which provides up-to-the-minute premium highlights, interviews and news segments to be distributed via multiple distribution platforms.

This content will launch during the MLG Anaheim Open, a two-day Call of Duty: Black Ops 3 tournament set to kick off on June 10, 2016. The MLG Anaheim Open will also be the inaugural event as part of a deeper collaboration with Facebook to broadcast live competitions and deliver ESR content to the 1.6 billion people on the social media platform.

Sepso explains why now is the perfect time for non-endemic brands to invest in eSports—a sport that was born and lives on digital platforms—in this exclusive interview.

How are things advancing with the MLG.tv advanced viewing experience (EVE) that you tested at the MLG Major in Columbus?

The enhanced viewing experience is something we’re only using during major live broadcasts. The initial alpha tests went well and we’re expanding on that. For the advertising community this is a very new technology, just as eSports is still very new for them. We’re bringing the EVE player to the forefront here in New York and explaining how unique it is, and how we can build cool and innovative initiatives to fans.

What do you see EVE and the new MLG.tv daily ESR broadcast opening up for sponsors?

They open up new things for advertising. MLG has a history of positioning partner brands as heroes that support our activity. We’re talking to brands about different ways the enhanced viewing experience can be used, including the traditional sports scoreboard sponsorship as well as native advertising units. It’s still very early, but this event is a way to launch into conversations with bigger brands and agencies. We want to maintain an open innovation-friendly relationship with the advertising world.

How much education still needs to be done with non-endemic brands?

They’re still largely pretty new to the space, so we’re going to be the tour guide for them into eSports. We’re a big partner that can combine both the scale of our network and authenticity with MLG in the eSports space with the size and experience of Activision Blizzard. We’re big and we’re innovative and we’re leaders in the space, and we’re also going to represent brands in a safe and authentic way. There’s still fear out there with a lot of brands that don’t want to jump into a new space that they don’t understand.

With both ESPN and Turner bringing eSports to traditional television, what role does digital play for advertisers interested in eSports?

One of the major themes of this year’s NewFronts is how much ad money is moving from traditional TV to digital video, and how quickly it’s happening. IPG (Interpublic Group of Companies) is moving a quarter billion away from TV to YouTube. If that’s not an indication that advertisers should start looking at digital, I don’t know what is. The millennial audience is consuming more content from digital than traditional television. It’s the native platform for eSports content. It’s the first sport that’s gotten to hundreds of millions of global viewers online and has succeeded in the digital space. Not being on TV is a strength at this point. It’s not just that eSports wasn’t designed for TV, but because of the power of digital reach and the ability to reach the entire globe simultaneously.

What do you see Facebook Live opening up for your digital reach?

We’ve seen a tremendous amount of reach through Facebook. We’ve been working with Facebook for a year-and-a-half now. We’re deepening our engagement with our video content and investing more with Facebook. The sports partnership team, which is led by Dan Reed, who came from the NBA, has been great to work with. It’s been a very collaborative partnership. We’re going to be creating exclusive Facebook Live content and broadcasting some content from the MLG Anaheim Open in June.

I’ve interviewed Dan Reed before and he was early into the eSports game, viewing eSports just like any traditional sport.

Facebook is successful for a reason. We’re going to invest more there. It’s a huge growth platform for us in reaching a new, more mainstream audience with content. We’ll weave brands through Facebook Live. We won’t do branded content, but weave brands into our own storylines.

How have you seen things evolve with traditional brands and non-endemics, who still like old-fashioned television?

You’ve been covering eSports long enough to remember that we did a TV series on USA Network 10 years ago. It’s important to establish the longevity and strengthening of the sport. But most millennial viewers never got cable. They consume everything digitally.

Our first CS:GO Major (MLG Columbus) generated over 45 million hours of views. And that was during the NCAA Final Four weekend. Some people weren’t watching basketball that weekend.

I was at Nationwide Arena in Columbus and it seemed like you could have sold even more seats there. The atmosphere was amazing with people cheering the Americans.

We were concerned with making sure everyone had a great experience in the arena, and we were experimenting with a huge stage that’s 200 feet wide. But if we had to do it again—we’d sell more seats.

How have you seen the Call of Duty: Black Ops 3 live event viewer being used?

With the MLG.tv integration into PlayStation 4, we’ve seen fans watch the Call of Duty Worlds in Black Ops 3.

But this partnership with Sony isn’t restricting our distribution—we’re expanding our reach with Facebook, and we continue to work with Twitch and YouTube. We’re working with Twitter, we’re looking at Snapchat and Instagram. With ESR, we’re taking as wide an approach as possible and tailoring the content to the platform.

How are you choosing which eSports titles to focus on?

As MLG and Activision Blizzard Media Network, we always focus on working directly with the publisher and we tend to be more conservative. We’re not going to create a lot of new stuff because one game is hot. Most of our success with the CS:GO Major in Columbus was the direct result of working closely with Valve. We have a CS:GO Minor at our MLG studio in Columbus May 22. Working closely with Valve has allowed us to do things like the enhanced viewing experience.

We’ve been around long enough to see the trends. There’s a lot of room for a lot of games to be successful in eSports. The key is how do we get to a sustainable business. What’s really important for me is celebrating the players and putting those personalities front and center.