Six contenders to be clashing for India cricket’s digital and television rights this year

Social Media tycoon Facebook and search engine giants Google will be competing against Mukesh Ambani’s Reliance Jio Infocomm Limited and Hotstar, the Indian digital and media entertainment platform, for Indian cricket’s online rights for the next five years which is about to happen this week.

The BCCI delayed the e-auction of the bilateral rights from March 27 to April 3, to send out necessary clarifications for those who have picked up the tender document. The Invitation To Tender (ITT) for the digital and television rights for the period of five years. i.e. April 2018 to March 2023, was declared on February 20.

The auction will be organised for the following packages:

• Global Television Rights with ROW Digital Rights Package
• Indian Subcontinent Digital Rights Package
• Global Consolidated Rights Package

The starting price for the digital rights for the first year during the five years per match has been set at ₹8 crores and ₹7 crores per match for the remaining four years. The base price for the television rights for the first year during the five years per match is ₹35 crores whereas ₹33 crores per match for the remaining four years.

Facebook, currently in the headlines for the data harvesting scam, last year had made a bid of whopping ₹3900 crores for the Indian Premier League (IPL) digital rights but lost to the winning bid of ₹16,347 crores by Star India.

Just after Facebook’s bid for cricket rights – the sport which American markets are not much responsive to – media expert Rupert Murdoch, who sold his share of 20th-century assets to Walt Disney Company, said that Facebook’s IPL bid made him change his perceptions towards the Indian sports rights market.

Along with Facebook TV trying to establish itself and Google flourishing on the video platform through YouTube, Jio Infocomm would be launching a cricket-intensive channel on JioTV app. Also, Hotstar being a successful subsidiary of Star India’s thriving television, the digital giants tend to have bigger plans than just bidding for the bilateral rights.

However, Star TV and Sony Pictures Network (SPN) may once again be the expected favourites for the global television rights. And with Yupp TV, a South Asia content provider founded by Uday Reddy, picking up the tender document, there are now a total of six contenders.