New Delhi: The Board of Control for Cricket in India on Sunday announced an open tender process for allocating the Indian Premier League’s global broadcasting rights, a move that conforms to the Lodha Committee recommendations on transparency.
“We are happy to announce the tender process for IPL Global Media Rights (TV and Digital),” Board president Anurag Thakur said. “The IPL is now the fastest growing league, most popular cricket league in the world and sixth most popular sports league in the world so it is very important for us to make it transparent when we announce the next tender process because it is going to be a historic bid in the history of cricket world.
“Talent meets opportunity is the tagline of IPL and in the last nine years, we have seen that the world has recognised IPL as their favourite league. Top players want to participate and BCCI is proud to introduce this league which others want to follow,” he added.
At present, the league’s media rights are held by Sony Pictures Network India, a deal that will end after the event’s next edition in 2017.
Sony Network had the first right to make an offer to the Board but the BCCI has decided to go for an open tender. The move is likely to find favour with the Supreme Court-appointed Lodha panel, which has called for transparency in the Board’s business deals.
In 2008, World Sports Group had bagged the IPL television rights for 10 years, for $918 million. It signed a deal with the Multi Screen Media, making Sony the official broadcaster.
The contract was reworked before the 2009 IPL edition with Multi Screen Media working out a $1.63 billion deal for nine years with the BCCI.
According to the fresh tender invitation, different packages for television and digital will be on offer, which includes the Indian sub-continent TV rights for 2018-2027, Indian sub-continent digital rights will be for five seasons from 2018-2022 and there will a five-minute delay for TV transmission.
“However, if the same person wins both TV and digital and if they wrote to BCCI, the five minute delay can be done away with,” the cricket Board’s chief executive Rahul Johri said.
As part of the process of bidding, the cricket board said there would be no obligation to accept the highest financial bid and that it would retain the discretion to amend the process at any time.
“It is in keeping with the highest level of transparency. The final definition of the best offer for BCCI, has to be left to the financial adviser,” Johri said.
