How Delane Parnell Beat the Game at Its Own Game

He was the living embodiment of the American Dream, a tireless entrepreneur who fought his way from Detroit’s meanest streets. Then Delane Parnell faced the moment that would define his gaming venture—and his life.

- By Kevin J. Ryan

The oldest child of a single mother, Delane Parnell grew up in an impoverished neighborhood off Detroit’s Seven Mile Road. His father was murdered a few months before he was born. His mother transported him from home to home as she bounced between jobs. Still, the young Parnell had a knack for business. By the time he was 17, he had parlayed a job mopping floors at a MetroPCS into co-owning three Detroit-area cellphone shops.

Seven years later, a chance meeting with a venture capitalist inspired Parnell to move to Los Angeles and found a gaming startup. His company had a name— PlayVS—but little else beyond office space at startup studio Science Inc. Still, he had no funding, no employees. Despite all that, his goal was nothing short of bringing e-sports to the highly lucrative and largely untapped high school market.

He was on the verge of fulfilling his lifelong dream— or failing miserably.