ENCE Moves to File for Bankruptcy, Ending 13 Years in Counter-Strike

ENCE, the Finnish organization that reached the grand final of a Counter-Strike Major, one of the largest tournaments of the calendar, in 2019, announced on Monday, October 26, that its board of directors had decided to file for bankruptcy. HLTV reported that the organization would halt business after thirteen years in Counter-Strike. HLTV and Dot Esports reported the announcement, which ENCE posted on X. Dot Esports called it a 13-year run in esports.

The announcement came seven months after ENCE reset its Counter-Strike team and said it would rebuild around Finnish players. Its last lineup was built on the academy roster ENCE promoted in April.

Figures from HLTV, published October 26, 2026.

What ENCE announced

According to HLTV, ENCE said its board of directors had decided to file for bankruptcy and that the organization would stop operating after thirteen years in Counter-Strike. ENCE's post on X, as quoted by Dot Esports, said the board of ENCE eSports Oy had made the difficult decision to file for bankruptcy after 13 years. The company named in the post, ENCE eSports Oy, is the legal entity behind the organization; "Oy" is the Finnish abbreviation for a limited company. Neither ENCE nor the reports gave a reason for the decision.

Dot Esports, citing the Finnish newspaper Iltalehti, reported that ENCE had losses of more than €1.6 million over the previous two years. It also cited another report saying ENCE lost almost €940,000 in 2025 and ended that year with less than €2,000 in the bank; the outlet of that report was not named. Neither ENCE nor Dot Esports stated these figures as the cause of the decision.

Dot Esports also reported that ENCE thanked its supporters in the post for staying with it through every victory and defeat. HLTV reported that ENCE's head coach, Aleksi "allu" Jalli, wrote "Heartbroken." on X.

The team that made Finland a Counter-Strike country

ENCE built its name on a simple idea: a Finnish team, with Finnish players, competing against the world. A 2019 article on Tampere University's PlayLab site described an organization with teams in Counter-Strike: Global Offensive and Fortnite, and called its Counter-Strike side the world-famous Finnish team. It said that before ENCE, the two Finnish teams most people knew were 3DMAX and HAVU. It noted that the national public broadcaster, Yle, televised the team's matches when it qualified for a major tournament and that the telecom company Telia was its sponsor. It listed the original five as allu, Sami "XseveN" Laasanen, Jani "Aerial" Jussila, Aleksi "Aleksib" Virolainen and Jesse "Sergej" Salo.

That lineup reached the grand final of the IEM Katowice 2019 Major, HLTV recalled in its report on the closure, and Dot Esports wrote in March that the run, led by Aleksib and allu, gave the organization its #EZ4ENCE fan identity. The Katowice final was lost to Astralis. The PlayLab article added that ENCE had beaten Astralis, then the world's top-ranked team, at BLAST Pro Series Madrid in May 2019, and that after the StarLadder Berlin Major that year Aleksib was benched by his teammates, in the article's account to improve team dynamics, and replaced by Miikka "suNny" Kemppi, with allu becoming the team's in-game leader, the player who calls the strategy during a match. The article described the team as being at a turning point and said the new lineup's results would decide its future.

HLTV credited ENCE with three wins at the top-tier events it calls MVP events: two in 2019 with the Finnish lineup led by Aleksib, and one in 2023 with a lineup led by Marco "Snappi" Pfeiffer.

After the sale of the core

ENCE sold its international core to Team Falcons in December 2023, HLTV reported. ENCE's own page for the 2024 lineup, published on January 10, 2024, gave the detail: Falcons bought out the contract of SunPayus, the team's sniper, or AWPer, Snappi had already signed with Falcons, the contract of Pavle "maden" Bošković ended and he moved to the same team, and NertZ joined Heroic by activating a buyout clause, a contract term that lets a player leave if a set fee is paid. The organization announced the changes on its social media on December 16, 2023, and signed a Polish trio from the team 9INE to join Lukas "gla1ve" Rossander.

The rebuild produced one more trophy. Strafe reported on September 20, 2024 that ENCE beat Heroic in the grand final of Elisa Masters Espoo 2024 in front of a Finnish crowd, taking Nuke, Vertigo after three overtimes and Dust2, and that it was gla1ve's first title in almost five years. After the sale, according to HLTV, the organization went through several rebuilds of varying success, and it had not attended one of the events HLTV calls MVP events since September 2024. That puts the Espoo title about two years before the closure, and the sale of the international core about two years and ten months before it.

The reset of 2026

On March 11, 2026, ENCE published a statement titled "The next chapter of ENCE." It said that after a strategic review with company leadership and majority shareholders, the organization would refocus on Finland, which it called home, and rebuild its Counter-Strike team with Finnish players at the core. It gave the difficulty of competing internationally in the current esports ecosystem as the reason, and said some company staff roles would be affected by the restructuring. The main Counter-Strike 2 roster and coaching staff were moved to the bench and made available for transfer, which means other organizations could negotiate for their contracts: Players listed the benched lineup as sdy, podi, Neityu, F1KU and kRaSnaL, with enkay J as coach. ENCE said podi wanted to keep playing at Tier 1 level, the top tier of professional Counter-Strike, rather than join a Finnish project, and Players reported that he had been moved to the bench at his own request. A benched player is removed from the active lineup. ENCE also said its academy, the development roster that trains prospects below the main team, would keep operating during the transition.

On April 1, ENCE announced that its academy team would go on hiatus and become the interim main roster, which it described as a transition-period roster while it evaluated further changes. It said it would scout and trial players outside the current roster, that Eemeli Ikonen, its head of academy and senior team manager, would lead the team-building, and that it wanted to avoid rushed decisions. It also said the academy program, unveiled in spring 2022 with a first roster in July of that year, had seen twelve players come through in four years, among them podi, who was promoted to the main roster in 2024. Its youth team, ENCE Prospects, would keep playing in the Finnish league NUKE-Liiga.

In June, according to Dot Esports, allu returned as head coach. On the day of the announcement, Dot Esports placed the lineup 103rd in the global Valve Regional Standings, the ranking that feeds Major invitations.

What it means for the Finnish scene

Dot Esports argued in March that national scenes were not as strong as they once were, as international rosters let young players move abroad. On Valve's rankings at that time, the outlet listed four Finnish rosters, led by ENCE Academy at 101st, with the next at 135th, and it recalled that the Finnish team HAVU regularly ranked in the top 30 to 40 during ENCE's peak. It expected that it would take years for ENCE's rebuilt roster to return to the top 30; the roster it meant was ENCE's own.

On October 26, the day of the announcement, the lineup was 103rd in the Valve Regional Standings, according to Dot Esports, close to the 101st place ENCE Academy held in March and far from the top 30.

The closure follows others in the scene this autumn. HLTV reported on October 21 that Evil Geniuses would cease operations, and Inven Global reported on September 23 that Complexity Gaming had shut down after 23 years, as confirmed by its founder, Jason Lake. Each closure was confirmed separately.

What comes next

Few details are public yet. HLTV reported that allu, the head coach, said he would make a more detailed statement about himself and the team once the situation had settled.

Dot Esports said ENCE's announcement gave no details about player contracts or whether the roster will continue together. Whether another Finnish organization takes up the pathway ENCE described in March has not been announced.

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