The Board of Control for Cricket in India’s first e-auction for the media rights of the Indian team’s home matches for the next five years could not be completed on Tuesday, with three bidders still in the fray.
Out of the six companies that had entered the auction, only three remained as the proceedings on Tuesday ended at 6 pm, with Rs 4,442 crore being the highest bid reported for the global consolidated rights (broadcast and digital) category.
Current holders Star India, Sony Pictures Networks India and Reliance Jio are the three companies who will continue bidding on Wednesday until two pull out. Star India had paid Rs 3,851 crore for 96 matches played by the Indian cricket team in India from April 2012 to March 2018. The cycle for which bidding is taking place, from 2018 to 2023, includes 102 matches.
According to updates posted by the BCCI on Twitter, the bid amount increased from Rs 4,176 crore to Rs 4,201.20 crore, to Rs 4,244 crore, with further reports stating there were bids of Rs 4,303 crore and Rs 4,328.25 crore before the final one of the day at Rs 4,442 crore.
The three categories of rights on sale are the Indian television rights and rest of the world digital rights, Indian subcontinent digital rights, and the global consolidated rights. Star India had bought the global consolidated rights for the Indian Premier League for Rs 16,347.50 crore last year.
Sony, which had the IPL rights from 2008 to 2017, then went ahead and bought the rights for England and Australian cricket, taking their tally to seven international cricket boards. If Sony manages to bag the Indian cricket rights, they will pretty much have all international cricket in their kitty, except for ICC tournaments and series played in Bangladesh and New Zealand, which are still with Star.
Reliance Jio has never held Indian cricket media rights so far.
What is an e-auction?
The bidders, during the e-auction process, will be able to see every offer live online. They, however, will not be able to establish the identity of the bidders. The bidders will only be revealed after the bid process is over.
This process is a marked departure from the BCCI’s conventional closed-bid auction model, where bids could be submitted only once in sealed envelopes. The Supreme Court-appointed Committee of Administrators felt that an e-auction is more transparent in terms of competitive price discovery.
The e-auction will allow the participants to see each other’s offers and file incremental bids (with fixed slabs) after each round until competitors pull out of the race.
