ENCE Ends Partnership With Its Sponsor, Jimm’s PC-store

This is a very ugly situation for ENCE, but it wasn’t their fault. How could they have known that their sponsor Jimm’s PC-store, which is a Finnish company, was selling drones to Russia?

And we’re not talking about a few drones. We’re talking about millions of Euros worth of drones, at a time when Finland is seriously worried about Russia attacking the country at some point in the next five years. This is why they became a NATO member a year ago.

ENCE’s Decision

pic.twitter.com/UMqKkyWYmu

— ENCE (@ENCE) April 9, 2024

ENCE was founded in 2013, so more than a decade ago. Since then, they’ve become a world-class esports organization and by far the most prestigious esports org in Finland. At the moment, their CS2 team is represented by legendary players like gla1ve, as well as numerous Polish competitors.

Over the years, ENCE had players like SunPayus and Spinx, who are now among the best in the world.

For an org of this caliber to be associated with a company that betrayed its own country and sold powerful weapons to a political adversary is unacceptable. That is why ENCE took immediate action after the Jimm’s PC-store incident was reported by the Finnish press.

We don’t know exactly what happened there but apparently, the police uncovered Jimm’s PC-store’s illegal operations and it was concluded that the store sold around 2 million Euros worth of drones to Russia.

In 2023, Jimm’s PC-store had an annual revenue of $18 million. That makes 2 million Euros a lot of money for them and therefore, the temptation to sell all of those drones without caring about where they will end up was probably high.

Of course, we don’t know the exact details of this transaction. Did Jimm’s PC-store know in advance that they were selling them to Russia? Were they bought by a different client, who then sold them to Russia? The case will likely be settled in court in the coming months and years.

For the time being, the company is accused of wrongdoing and ENCE decided to immediately cut all ties with it, most probably unilaterally. The esports community praised their decision but the truth is that they had very little choice.

From a PR perspective, having a sponsor that messed up so badly could have completely destroyed the company’s reputation.

The fact that they acted so promptly makes it clear that ENCE does not endorse in any way Jimm’s PC-store’s actions.

Header: ENCE