Turkish Airlines will be the official transportation partner for the BLAST Pro Series’ inaugural Istanbul tournament.

Further details on the partnership will be disclosed at a later date.

Other aviation brands including AirAsia, Airbus, and Emirates Airline are also exploring the esports market.

Turkish Airlines has been named transportation partner for the first Istanbul installment in the BLAST Pro Series. Further details on the deal will be revealed later in the year.

The Blast Pro Series is a Counter-Strike: Global Offensive tournament circuit, owned and operated by RFRSH Entertainment . The series began with a sold-out, 12K attendee Copenhagen tournament in 2017, with a second Danish event planned for November.

[perfectpullquote align=”right” cite=”” link=”” color=”” class=”” size=””]September’s $250K prize pool Blast Pro Series in Istanbul will be the first held in Turkey.[/perfectpullquote]

September’s $250K prize pool Blast Pro Series in Istanbul will be the first held in Turkey, and the second tournament overall for the series. The event was originally scheduled for June 24, but after a snap election was called in Turkey for the same date, the tournament was pushed back to September 29.

Bettina Kuperman, CEO of Impact 34—an Istanbul sports and entertainment marketing company co-producing the event—said: “Ever since we announced we’d bring BLAST Pro Series to Istanbul, we have received a lot of attention from fans, broadcasters and some of the biggest Turkish and international brands.”

Turkish Airlines joins a number of aviation brands looking to explore the esports market. Low cost Malaysian airline AirAsia partnered with Alisports as a title sponsor for the WESG ASEAN tournament, is a sponsor of Mineski’s Dota 2 team, and bought and rebranded its own Mobile Legends team—AirAsia Saiyan. Meanwhile, Airbus currently sponsors its own League of Legends team, Out of the Blue, and last year, Emirates partnered with ESL to introduce esports as inflight entertainment.