Yes, you read that right. Financial modelling on Excel will now officially be an e-sport.
Microsoft’s spreadsheet software is used worldwide to keep track of financials and for task management. However, data entry is not the first thing that comes to mind when one thinks of e-sports. Although that clearly hasn’t stopped Microsoft from turning financial modeling into one.
The announcement was made on Microsoft Excel’s official Twitter handle. Although it seems like a joke, it’s too late to be an April Fool’s prank.
As of June 8, Microsoft Excel will no longer just be a humble spreadsheet software. You can watch eight highly skilled financial modelers around the globe compete in the first-ever Microsoft Excel Financial Modeling World Cup.
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The players:
The participants are Andrew Ngai from the UK, Michael Jarman from Canada, Stéphanie Annerose from the USA, Jason Webber from South Africa, John Lim from Australia, Gabriela Stroj from Poland, Anup Agarwal from India, and Jeff Heng Siang Tan from Malaysia.
Viewers are encouraged to catch the live tournament on Financial Modelling World Cup’s official YouTube channel at 12 PM UTC, June 8.
The event will be judged by Microsoft MVP Danielle Stein Fairhurst and Adam Callens, who is a Senior Program Manager at Microsoft. So, how will the contestants be judged? On what basis will their work be evaluated? Well, according to Microsoft:
“They (the judges) will be taking the lead of the event by “dissecting” participant models as they are being created. Perhaps they will be able to spot some use-cases where taking advantage of the latest Excel functionalities might do the trick more efficiently.”
Although no one would have ever imagined something like an Excel war becoming a competitive e-sport, this clearly opens up the door for new possibilities. It is not every day that we see an entirely new form of e-sports being born. Especially not in the form of a Microsoft Office program!
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