Campus and Community

POGG: a training platform for the next eSports superstars

eSports players can develop their gaming skills through POGG.

According to Newzoo, the eSports audience will grow to almost 500 million people globally. Global eSports revenue reaches more than $1 billion. These numbers are already greater than American Football and Rugby combined. With this in mind, the 4 Técnico students launched POGG: Simão Nunes, Gonçalo Costa and Martim Afonso (Computer Science and Engineering), and Mariana Guedes (Mechanical Engineering).

Inspired by the contact they already had with the world of electronic sports, the four Técnico students started to outline POGG. The idea itself has been improved over time. “Being aware of the national panorama allowed us to understand the players needs and, in a way, to experience those same needs. Knowing our audience is our great advantage”, says Simão Nunes. The project started at JUNITEC-Junior Enterprises at IST, but it has been growing. POGG has been frequently highlighted by the Portuguese eSports market, and who knows, maybe in the next years, it will reach international markets.

“For players, it is not enough to train and learn regularly on their own. Not only the progress is incomplete, but it is also inefficient and slow”, says Simão Nunes. The Técnico student explains “professional eSports players work closely with a professional coach every day. A professional coach is someone who has remarkable analysis and evaluation skills that even eludes best players”. “Therefore, it is difficult to evolve without the help of a coach”, says the Técnico student.

Finding coaches available to coach a common player is not an easy task, largely due to the gap created between highly qualified coaches and common players, especially those who are taking their first steps in the world of eSports. In order to solve these problems, the Técnico students created POGG, a kind of Marketplace that connects eSports players who want to evolve in their careers and the best coaches today.

POGG provides eSports players 3 training modes: ‘Live Coaching’, ‘Demo Review’ and Academies. In the first two modes, it is possible to submit a demo to be analyzed by the experts, or to request live advice, with comments and adjustments in real time. The Academies consist of a set of subscription packages provided by competent entities, which provide access to exclusive content. “With this option, we promote a continuous and closer monitoring of coaches”, stresses Simão Nunes.

In all these training modes, the user can access all the feedback and information included in the training process, which will allow to analyse and improve player’s performance. In addition, the platform also includes a class evaluation mechanism that is used as soon as the training is complete. “The players feedback is used to position coaches according to the best scores on POGG search page, promoting those with higher scores”, says the co-founder of POGG.

A platform that has everything it takes to be successful

According to the Técnico students, many young people are becoming increasingly interested in eSports, and the market is growing in Portugal. “The Portuguese eSports market is not as developed as abroad, but it is growing at great speed. The number of enthusiasts are growing not only due to the playful component associated with video games, but also due to the professionalization that is now possible to obtain. This is also due to new national events and competitions with very attractive cash prizes, some of which reach 100 thousand euros”.

POGG celebrated the first partnership with one of the big Portuguese football clubs: Sporting Clube de Portugal. “This is the right first partner. Besides being a club with great recognition that will undoubtedly help us to get close to many of our potential users, it has helped us to make POGG more appealing both to players and to other partners”, says Simão Nunes. The entrepreneurs aim to increase the number of partnerships with major eSports entities.

Two months ago, the POGG team competed for the StartUP Voucher and won two grants. “It was undoubtedly one of the highest points. These grants will allow us to invest in our next steps”, stresses the Técnico student. However, the StartUP Voucher programme will also provide winners the opportunity to choose an incubator. “We chose Tagusvalley and it has been great so far. We have had meetings on a weekly basis with Homero Cardoso (project manager) and Rui Almeida (mentor), from AIRV, who have given us some entrepreneurial orientation, which is something new to us”, says Simão Nunes.

POGG was officially launched on 12th of October. “Finally we were able to share with the public something that we have been working with a lot of expectations”, shares the Técnico student. “The public received POGG with great enthusiasm, which captivated the attention of a lot of users and coaches”, recalls Simão Nunes.

“We want that POGG grow together with the eSports ecosystem”, stresses the Técnico student. “We still have a long way to go. The ideal scenario would be to expand POGG to other European countries and, if possible, to another continent in the next 5 years”, says the co-founder of POGG.