The decision means that Millenium’s current Rainbow Six roster will be looking for a new organisation to represent from Season 9 onwards.
The organisation was founded in 2002 by Cédric Page, but only as an esports news, media and coverage platform for a French audience. Their first expansion into esports team ownership was in 2006, and they entered into Rainbow Six with the signing of the Yunktis roster in early 2017.
However, with esports ballooning in popularity, leading to larger organisations entering various esports with much larger pockets, Millenium saw a mismatch between its teams ambitions and the budget required at this level. As such, in a bid to return Millenium to its roots as a community hub, Page has decided to shut down its esport division and release all teams.
In Rainbow Six, Millenium started off with the ex-Yunktis roster of Joghurtzz, Renshiro, Liven, Sixquatre, and sTiZze in Season 4 of the Pro League. A fairly unimpressive showing saw them finish in 5th-6th place where they survived relegations to stay in the Pro League.
With Falko replacing a retired Sixquatre, Season 5 saw a much stronger showing from them, however, as they finished in 3rd place in Europe behind ENCE eSports and PENTA Sports (now G2 Esports), but lost to Team FONTT (now FaZe Clan) in the Quarter Finals at LAN.
Millenium with the DreamHack Austin 2018 Rainbow Six trophy
Season 6 was a more modest showing from the French squad, as they finished in 4th place with Aherys in place of Falko. The side would also attempt to qualify for the 2018 Six Invitational with Elemzje and Hicks, but fall to Supremacy (now Team Vitality) early on.
Swapping out Elemzje for risze, and in the hunt for yet another LAN appearance, Season 7 would bear fruits as they made it as far as the Semi Finals in a bid for a second title for the roster after their Season 2 victory with Yunktis. However, their first title with the now fairly different roster came at the DreamHack Austin 2018 event where they overcame a tough challenge from Evil Geniuses.
Fresh off their strong showing in Texas, their attempt at securing a third overall title at the Six Major Paris would be thwarted in the Quarter Finals by eventual champions G2 Esports. Returning to the regular Pro League, with AceeZ in place of Joghurtzz, they would play well enough to stay in the race for a Rio de Janeiro Pro League Finals appearance.
With just one last week left in the Pro League, their appearance in Brazil comes down to a single game -- a win against their next and final opponents Mock-it Esports will see them through to LAN. However, thanks to Mock-it playing with renewed vigour, and Millenium suffering somewhat after switching to English communications with AceeZ now onboard, the odds are against them.
With Team Vitality set to play in the relegation playoffs, and this news today, rumours have already begun swirling in anticipation of the mammoth French organisation signing this Millenium roster.
Catch them in action as Millenium for possibly the last time on Thursday, the 25th of October, at twitch.tv/Rainbow6 from an estimated time of 7 PM CET (GMT+1).
The Millenium squad is thus:
Gaël "Liven" Gruyere
Olivier "Renshiro" Vandroux
Théophile "Hicks" Dupont
Valentin "risze" Liradelfo
Maurice "AceeZ" Erkelenz
Laurent "Crapelle" Patriarche (Coach)
Jack "Sparxo" Wright (Analyst)