Microsoft’s mixer platform lures gamer Ninja from Amazon’s Twitch

Tyler “Ninja” Blevins, a gaming phenom who draws millions of fans to watch him play via streaming, is jumping to Microsoft Corp.’s Mixer platform.

The move is a blow for Amazon.com Inc.’s Twitch, a rival streaming service where Blevins has dominated viewership over the past two years. At 14.7 million followers, he has more than twice as many as the next-closest streamer. Earlier this year, he set a record of 667,000 viewers watching at once, breaking his own previous record of 628,000.

Luring Blevins, who also streamed on Alphabet Inc.’s YouTube, is a coup for Mixer, a relative upstart in streaming video. Microsoft is betting that Blevins’s appeal will be strong enough to drag esports fans away from the bigger services they’re familiar with.