Teenage champs turn millionaire professionals

History suggests every once in a while, teenage prodigies - think tennis ace Boris Becker and chess champ Viswanathan Anand - take the multi-billion-dollar sports-and-games industry by storm, winning adults' titles, raking in millions of dollars and cultivating countless fans.

Now, Chinese teenager and e-sports superstar Jian Zihao, 17, has gone one step further and, by dint of his sheer brilliance, created an altogether new lucrative online market for digital game Webcasts.

"Just like basketball and tennis players, e-sports professionals who stand out in international competitions are becoming celebrities, and have lots of fans," said Xue Yongfeng, a senior analyst at Beijing-based Internet consultancy Analysys International.