Melany M. June 24, 2019
Dignitas has a new home.
The organization celebrated the grand opening of its new content and media facility, a 3,000-square-foot space in Newark, New Jersey. This new training ground is located near the New Jersey Devils’ home, the Prudential Center. The team and arena are both owned by Dignitas parent company Harris Blitzer Sports and Entertainment.
The Dignitas gaming and media facility features a 500-square foot content studio sponsored by social media platform Caffeine. The studio will be used for Dignitas’ content creation efforts and includes two soundproof pods for streaming and recording. It is nearly 15 minutes from midtown Manhattan, which will put Dignitas close to the east coast servers of many online titles.
The facility will be the training home for all Dignitas teams. The organization currently competes in League of Legends, Rocket League, Counter-Strike: Global Offensive, Super Smash Bros., SMITE, Clash Royale, and Apex Legends.
"This new facility drives to the heart of where Dignitas is moving as a leader in the gaming centric entertainment: with a heavy focus on player excellence, influencer development and content production that will drive key narratives across the confluence of esports,” Dignitas CEO Michael Prindiville said. “Newark is the perfect place to develop the next wave of competitive gamers and entertainers.”
The grand opening included a Rocket League event with Dignitas pro player Jos "Violent Panda" van Meurs. The facility will soon host a bootcamp for the Dignitas Female CSGO squad in preparation for the DreamHack Showdown in Valencia, Spain.
The investment comes alongside other big initiatives from Dignitas. Early this month, Harris Blitzer Sports and Entertainment closed a merger between Clutch Gaming and Dignitas. The deal positions Dignitas to return to the LCS after being previously denied by Riot Games. Clutch Gaming will be rebranded as Dignitas in 2020. It remains unclear if the squad will bootcamp at the new facility or if they will remain on the West Coast.
The move also follows a recent trend of esports organizations opening new homes for their teams to streamline content production efforts.