Our MD, Jon Winkle, ran his first gaming event in 2003 while studying at university as a hobby before moving on to a full time career in the marketing industry specialising in leisure and fitness marketing in the public and charitable sector.
Throughout that time, Jon continued to run gaming events alongside his successful marketing career as EPIC.LAN grew to become one of the most respected names in community gaming and esports in the UK before finally taking the full time leap in 2018.
Now with nearly 20 years of experience, Jon and the EPIC.LAN team are often asked to advise on gaming and esports projects from the outset. Whether that’s simple queries like how much time is needed to run a tournament, through to complex technical solutions around game data to developing esports tournament series, events, brand strategy or facility development.
When engaging with EPIC.LAN as esports consultants, you’ll be working with some of the most experienced names in UK esports who will give realistic, practical and honest solutions to those looking at entering or developing their presence in esports.We have seen many successes and failures, since before competitive gaming was even called esports and we’re not afraid to say if it’s not the right approach just as much as we’ll help develop success.
EPIC.LAN’s independence as an event operator and technical solutions agency has also given us an extremely strong network of industry professionals, so if we can’t help directly we will certainly be able to recommend the right people to speak to.
Guest Speaker/Lecturer in Esports
Jon is a regular speaker on various esports panels, representing community/amateur esports in the UK as well as technical topics around event management and league operations. Recent speaking engagements have included:
- EGX 2017 Twitch Stage – Grassroots Esports & Its Importance
- ESI Birmingham 2018 – Community, the lifeblood of all things gaming
- ESI London 2018 – Casinos, It’s Time to Turn to Video Games
- ESI Brighton 2019 – Why should publishers work with third party TOs
- British Esports Association – Esports Careers Advice
- Staffordshire University London Digital Institute – #CommunityVoices – Running events during the pandemic
- NSE FutureGen 2021 Guest Speaker
- EPIC34 – Building Gaming Communities
- University of Northampton 2021-23 – Associate Lecturer – Esports Event Management
- EPIC35 – Esports Careers Panel
- Liverpool John Moores University March 2022 – Guest Lecture (Event Management degree)
- HOST Esports Festival March 2022 – Talent Pipeline – How to create healthy pathways into the esports industry
- Esports Venue Summit 2022 – Has the pandemic reshaped future in-person esports tournaments
- Esports Venue Summit 2022 – Panel discussion on esports ready venues
