The Cyberathlete Professional League (CPL) announced today that ATI Technologies Inc. has become a Worldwide Title Sponsor of the CPL.

ATI will provide the title sponsorship role for all CPL's worldwide computer games tournaments, including a primary sponsorship of the CPL Winter 2006 Championships, taking place December 13–17, 2006 in Dallas, Texas. The sponsorship is touted as demonstrative of ATI’s long-standing commitment to support the computer gaming community, but no matter how you spin it, it's a no-brainer tie-in of PC gaming with PC gaming graphics technology.

"We are very excited that ATI has joined us as a lead sponsor," said Angel Munoz, Founder and President of the CPL. "ATI’s support will assist us in expanding our league’s presence at a global scale, and we’re thrilled that they have selected us to showcase their newest cutting-edge graphics technologies."

The CPL has long pushed the perception of computer games competitions into the realm of professional sport. The CPL is hoping the Winter 2006 Championships will be the premier computer gaming competition in North America, as such events are already favored by professional gamers worldwide. (Yes, there's such a thing as "professional" gamers; they have sponsors, get paid and win huge money and everything.)

Over the past nine years, the CPL has hosted 50 international main events with a total attendance of 160,000 gamers and has awarded over US$3,000,000 in prizes.