Esports infrastructure company Vindex has hired Pablo Arizmendi-Kalb as the new chief operating officer of Belong Gaming Arenas.
In his new role, Arizmendi-Kalb will take the reins of “multi-unit retail operations” as part of Belong’s expansion to hundreds of locations throughout the United States.
Prior to joining the Vindex family, Arizmendi-Kalb spent two years as president at Florida-based medical cannabis company Curaleaf. Prior to that, he spent 18 years at Starbucks in various roles, three years at the Coca-Cola Company as its Latin America marketing director, five years as a brand manager at Nestlé USA, and one year at Microsoft as its Latina America sales and marketing manager.
Arizmendi-Kalb joins former CSL Esports exec Wim Stocks, who left the company in December to join Belong. Earlier this month, Activision Blizzard Director of Product & Platform Strategy for esports Kasey Kramer joined Belong.
Vindex acquired Belong from UK-based retailer Game Digital in July of 2020. At the time, the company said that it would invest $300M USD over the next five years, and open 1,000 locations globally. Some of those locations will be in the United States, which Arizmendi-Kalb has been brought on to spearhead.
