Natus Vincere

Natus Vincere (Latin for "born to win"),[1] commonly referred as abbreviated name NAVI (formerly Na`Vi), is a Ukrainian esports organization based in Kyiv.

In October 2009, Murat "Arbalet" Zhumashevich declared the creation of an esports organization during the Intel Extreme Masters tournament being held in Dubai.

On 17 December 2009, Natus Vincere, at the time with the name of Arbalet UA, was formed, based around their Counter-Strike team, which consisted of players Ivan "Edward" Sukharev, Yegor "markeloff" Markelov, Sergey "starix" Ischuk, Arsenij "ceh9" Trunozhenko and Danylo "Zeus" Teslenko, with ZeroGravity taking the position of manager.

[5][6] In the middle of May 2010, Na'Vi took 2nd place in the prestigious Arbalet Cup Europe 2010 in Stockholm, losing to Fnatic in the finals and earning $10,000 in prize money.

[9] On 4 July 2010, Natus Vincere achieved the highest accolade in the history of Ukrainian e-Sports, winning the ESWC (which previously could not be reached by any CIS team), defeating SK Gaming in the finals: 16:5 (de_train) and 16:4 (de_inferno).

[14][15] On 15 August, Na'Vi won the Ukrainian qualifications for the 2010 World Cyber Games and received a paid voucher to the finals in Los Angeles from 30 September to 3 October 2010.

[17] This victory made Na'Vi the first team in the world which had managed to hold the three most prestigious championship titles at once (IEM, ESWC, WCG).

At the end of October 2010, ESL TV commentator Bakr "KinGSaicx" Fadl proclaimed that SK Gaming was going to invite the Ukrainian team to take place of its Swedish squad, but the manager of Natus Vincere declined this information.

After finishing the group stage Na'Vi consistently outplayed teams puta, Fnatic, Frag Executors, and mTw.dk in the finals, winning the tournament.

Na'Vi won Intel Extreme Masters Season X - San Jose after beating Team SoloMid (Now Astralis) in the grand finals 2–0.

[citation needed] Na'Vi had a successful year in 2016, starting with their victory over Luminosity Gaming (now MiBR) at DreamHack Leipzig 2016 on 22 January.

[45] Na'Vi also cooperated with Hator, producer of gamers oriented computer equipment, in coorganizing esport events in 22 cities of Ukraine.

[46] They proceeded to qualify for the Blast Spring Final[47] and made it to the playoffs of IEM Katowice 2022, being favored to win the event.

NAVI qualified to the Legends Stage of the Blast Paris Major 2023,[69] where they failed to make it to the playoffs after being eliminated by FaZe Clan.

[70] On 30 June, NAVI announced a new international roster made up of Finnish in-game leader Aleksi "⁠Aleksib⁠" Virolainen, Lithuanian Justinas "⁠jL⁠" Lekavičius, and Romanian Mihai "⁠iM⁠" Ivan playing alongside s1mple and b1t, following the benchings of npl, Perfecto and electronic.

[75] On 19 February, it was announced that s1mple had returned to professional Counter-Strike, with a one-month loan to Saudi Arabian organization Team Falcons.

Initially the team was composed of Aleksandr "XBOCT" Dashkevych, Artur "Goblak" Kostenko, Bogdan "Axypa" Boychuk, Oleksandr "Deff" Stepaniuc, and Andriy "Mag~" Chipenko.

The empty slots on the team were filled by Ukrainian players from DTS.Chatrix—Danil "Dendi" Ishutin, and Ivan "Artstyle" Antonov, who became the captain of this new squad.

[citation needed] A roster change on 17 June 2011, resulted in the replacements of Goblak and Axypa with Clement "Puppey" Ivanov and Dmitriy "LighTofHeaveN" Kupriyanov.

[citation needed] At The International 2012, Na'Vi attempted to defend their title where they ultimately placed 2nd, losing to the Chinese team Invictus Gaming 1–3 in the grand finals.

[citation needed] In August 2013, Na'Vi once again reached the Grand Finals of The International 2013, but they lost 2–3 in a very close fifth game against the Swedish team Alliance.

[citation needed] On 5 April 2015, Na'Vi announced the return of Funn1k and ArtStyle with VANSKOR moving to reserve after battling a long-term illness.

[citation needed] On 27 August 2015, Na'Vi announced the departure of captain Ivan "Artstyle" Antonov following a disappointing finish at The International 2015.

It includes four Russian players: Vadim "POKAMOLODOY" Ulshin, Ivan "Ubah" Kapustin, Dmitry "Shade1" Roshchin and Svyatoslav "Drainys" Komissarov.

[131] Natus Vincere made an entrance into Rainbow Six Siege Pro League by acquiring the German roster of Mock-it E-sports in February 2019.

[2] The original Na'Vi Rainbow Six Siege roster was Pascal "Cry1NNN" Alouane, Lukas "Korey" Zwingmann, Jan "ripz" Hucke, Niklas "KS" Massierer, and Lasse "Lazzo" Klie.

[132] On 1 June 2019, Na'Vi announced that they had signed on the British roster of MnM Gaming shortly after it had qualified for Pro League Season 10.

About a month after on 18 December, GiG left the roster and analyst Cyril "jahk" Renoud would be the team's acting coach.

[138] In 2024, Na'Vi donated the organization's portion of the prize money, totaling US$125,000, to support the use of unmanned ground vehicles in the Ukrainian armed forces during the Russian invasion of Ukraine.

[139][140] NAVI are members of the Esports World Cup Foundation Club Support Program, funded by Saudi Arabia's Public Investment Fund, which gives teams monetary rewards for painting the Esports World Cup tournament series in a positive light and driving engagement to the tournament, which is seen to some as a sportswashing tool that Saudi Arabia is using to distract the public from their poor human rights record.

Na'Vi winning ESWC 2010
Natus Vincere won IEM San Jose 2015.
Na'Vi and former prime minister of Ukraine Mykola Azarov