BCCI media rights e-auction breaches Rs 50-bn mark; bid war intensifies

As the bidding for the media rights to the Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) intensifies, the bid price has breached the Rs 50 billion mark. According to sources, the latest bid (in the round that concluded at 3 pm) was at Rs 54.88 billion. This marks a 42 per cent jump in the price that incumbent rights holder Star India was paying the BCCI for 2012-18 cycle (Rs 38.51 billion or Rs 430 million per match).

Three companies – Star India, Sony Pictures Network India (SPN) and Reliance Jio are currently embroiled in an intense bid war for the coveted rights which include 102 international matches across 190 days in 2018-23 cycle. The bidding started on April 3 and was carried forward to the next day when no successful outcome was reached on the first day of the e-auction.

Three categories of rights have been put on sale by the BCCI – global television rights and rest of the world digital rights (GTVRD), digital rights for the Indian subcontinent alone (ID), and the global consolidated rights comprising worldwide TV and digital rights (GCR). As was the case with the Indian Premier League, if the global consolidated bid exceeds the sum of the GTVRD and ID, then that bid wins. If not, the individual bids – India television+global digital and India digital rights will be deemed winners.

The base price for the 2018-19 season for the GTVRD is Rs 350 million, Rs 80 million for ID and Rs 430 million for the global consolidated rights. For the 2019-2023 tenure, the base price for GTVRD is Rs 330 million, for ID is Rs 70 million and Rs 400 million for GCR.