In the ongoing e-auction of the media rights for the Indian Premier League (IPL) 2023-27 cycle, two different broadcasters have reportedly bagged the TV (package A) and digital rights (package B) for the Indian subcontinent.
With an increase in the total number of matches per season after the addition of two new teams in the lucrative league, the total value per match for every IPL game now stands at Rs 107.5 crore.
According to a report by Cricbuzz, the yet-to-be identified company, which has bagged the TV rights for Rs 57.5 crore per game, had challenged the company bidding RS 48 crore per game for digital rights.
“But looks like the bids for digital have ended at RS 50 Crore per game and it is understood to have been bagged by Jio (Viacom18),” the Cricbuss report stated.
It further said that while Jio (Viacom 18) or HotStar (Disney-Star) could have picked the Indian subcontinent digital rights, it has been indicated that Sony have bagged the Indian subcontinent TV rights. The combined value for Package A (TV Rights) and Package B (Digital) is RS 44,075 crore.
“The final count for TV is Rs 23,575 crore while the digital has ended at Rs 20,500 crore. The digital rights, which closed at Rs 48 crore per game in the first round, ended at the half century mark with the rights seemingly going to the original winner of the digital rights. The challenger, it seems, backed out after a couple bids of Rs 50 lakh each,” added the report.
Before the e-auction, industry pundits had predicted that the rights for the next cycle is likley to fetch the BCCI over Rs 50,000 crore.
However, unlike the previous times, there are four categories for the rights this time, which are namely: TV Rights for Indian Sub-continent, Digital Rights, 18 games (inaugural game, weekend double headers, 4 play-off games) and Rest of the World.
Earlier, Star India, the current official broadcaster of the cash-rich league, had paid a whopping Rs 16,347.5 crore for the 2018-2022 cycle.
In February 2022, BCCI chief Sourav Ganguly had said that he was expecting a rise of more than double in value of IPL rights for the next 2023-27 cycle.
Earlier in October 2021, the Indian cricket board had already fetched Rs 12,725 Crore from the sale of two new IPL franchises – Lucknow and Ahmedabad.