Thanks for taking the time to sit down with us Nick. A quick intro of who you are would be great to start things off.

Sure! My name is Nick Fitzsimmons and I am the Vice President of Operations at X3O Emerging Technologies. I grew up playing games on both the PC and console. My first experience with competitive gaming was Counter-Strike in 2002. After playing for a few local teams, I quickly fell into a management/sixth man role. Around the same time I met Charlie Plitt and we spent several years building CEVO from the ground up. I left CEVO just prior to their inaugural season to work for X3O.

X3O has a history of cultivating top Counter-Strike 1.6 talent only to have its teams move to what appear to be more financially-stable organizations (with goodfornothing and co. moving to Gravitas, and the latest X3O.cs roster moving to compLexity). Does this frustrate you as a manager? Are you proud of what X3O appears to do for its players in terms of getting them noticed?

I am both proud and frustrated at the same time. As you can imagine, it's not easy to search through the thousands of available players and find five that have the same skill, desire to grow and passion for the game. Being able to build championship caliber teams multiple times is something that X3O will always be remembered for. But as you know, right when we get to the very top, things just seem to slip away. The most frustrating aspect isn't that the individual players would leave, but that it felt like X3O never got enough time at the top to truly realize our potential as a franchise.

Did you receive any monetary compensation from Gravitas or compLexity when your Counter-Strike teams left X3O?

I can't get into specifics, but yes, I feel that X3O was fairly compensated for our teams. There were no "shady" deals. If offers were made to one of our teams, we would talk about them openly and try to objectively come to a decision that was in the best interest of all parties involved.

Being someone who has worked closely with X3O Gaming in the past, I know you took great pride in hosting CS events at the X3O LAN Center. Looking back, were you happy with the turn-out those tournaments had? Do you feel the CS community appreciated the effort you put into hosting those events?

The tournaments at X3O Gaming Center in Rockville, MD are probably some of the fondest memories I have from gaming. Over the course of five years we grew our tournaments from being local 8 team events to the largest LAN center organized and operated tournaments in the country. I honestly feel that the community still appreciates all of the hard work that our staff put into making the events possible, and get asked regularly when we will be hosting another event.

After the departure of the latest Counter-Strike 1.6 roster to coL, X3O devoted itself entirely to its highly touted Counter-Strike: Source roster. At a time when competitive CSS was dwindling, why did X3O decide to support the game?

There were two main reasons why we continued to support our CSS team. The first was that simply they were the best at their game. I don't just mean that they never lost, though they did win every LAN they attended as X3O; they worked harder and were more dedicated than any other team. The second reason was that they earned it. PEX, AZK, Legend, adreN, and sunman all played for me for many years. They did their absolute best to represent X3O at all times, usually going above and beyond what was asked of them. That loyalty means something to me.

As we have seen, X3O has recently taken a step back from eSports entirely. Can you fill us in on the reason for this?

It does not make fiscal sense to be managing professional gamers at this time. There are a myriad of factors that contributed to the inevitable end of an era in competitive gaming. In the past decade we saw events and teams steal money from players and sponsors, the CGS completely turn the community upside down, and the overall economy plummet. Marketing staff at companies around the world are re-evaluating their shrinking budgets, and are just not excited about getting involved. The few teams that are still successful have found their niche and built reliable revenue streams outside of sponsorship funds.

The next obvious question would be: what can we expect from X3O in terms of gaming? Will you be making a comeback to eSports?

I don't know when X3O will be directly managing competitive gamers again. I am open to the idea, but have not found the right opportunity yet. X3O still evaluates teams and provides consulting for several companies still actively engaged. It probably would coincide with us re-launching our gaming centers.

Also, what is going on with the X3O LAN Center itself?

We closed down our gaming center in Rockville, MD at the end of last year in preparation for re-opening in a new one. We plan on building a larger facility in Maryland, however we do not have a set date. I would not expect it to open before 2011. In the meantime we have continued to grow the IT side of our business, and have quickly become one of the leading support providers for businesses in the Washington, D.C. Metro area.

Being a highly respected figure in North-American eSports, why do you think there are so few sponsor-supported and successful North-American eSport organizations?

There is no easy answer to this, other than to say that the perceived value of marketing to the gamer demographic in North America is less than in Europe. We have always had a difficult time creating value for sponsors. To me, demonstrating value is simply showing how sponsoring your team costs less than other marketing initiatives, while returning more profit. The culture and demographic for gamers in Europe and Asia is fundamentally different than in North America. Without getting into a huge discussion, their entire support structure from activity of fans, number of events, and the overall gaming culture of the general populace is more appealing to sponsors.

Any final words Nick?

I just wanted to take a moment to thank everyone that has supported X3O over the years. A lot of our success would not have happened without the dedication of our players, the commitment from our sponsors like Dust-Off, and the overall support of our fans.

Specifically thank you to PO, Justin, AZO, Eric, Kevin, Ryan, Tarik, Andrew, Jeff, David, Derek, Rob, Ediz, Matt, Derrick, Ben, Dan...the list goes on. Thank you for playing so hard for X3O and for me.