Sports sponsorship in India grew by 17% in 2019 and crossed the Rs 9000 crore mark, according to the Indian Sports Sponsorship Report 2020.
The report released by ESP Properties- the entertainment and sports division of GroupM India on Thursday stated that the on ground sponsorship revenue grew by 25% to cross the Rs 2000 crore mark while the digital sponsorship revenue shot up by a whopping 84% from Rs 475 crore to Rs 875 crore.
The rise in sponsorship revenue was largely driven by cricket which registered a strong growth of 43% with a total revenue of Rs 1290 crore.
“BCCI’s official sponsorship scoreboard was bolstered by strong associations led by Paytm, which retained the Title Sponsorship rights till 2023 for an amount of Rs 326.8 crore. At Rs 3.8 crore per match, this deal with the mobile payments’ platform paid off very well for India’s governing body for cricket since this bid was 58% higher than the previous per match sponsorship value of Rs 2.4 crore,” the report said.
“In addition to Paytm, the year also saw BCCI completing the dream team by roping in Dream11, LafargeHolcim (ACC Cement and Ambuja Cement) and Hyundai Motor as official sponsors
for the next four years. These three partnerships accounted for Rs 2.59 crore per match, which was of 72% higher value than in the previous cycle,” it added.
Speaking about the observations from the report, ESP Properties Business Head Vinit Karnik said, “While cricket proved its dominance in 2019, overall the last 5 years the industry has doubled its size. If we look further, we can see a strong CAGR of 12.8% in the business of sports over the last 10 years, making it one of the strong pillars of the Indian economy.
“With the sports industry growing at 17% in 2019, the momentum on sports with added thrust from the government provides a holistic opportunity for the sector. Initiatives like Khelo India and Fit India movement are drivers towards making India a truly sporting nation,” he was quoted as saying in ESP’s press release.
Among other sports, football leapfrogged kabaddi to be the second highest grosser in on-ground sponsorship after cricket.
The report also stated that the endorsement industry grew by 11% with 85% of total brand endorsements coming from cricketers.
Among the 70 new brand endorsement deals in 2019, 50 were done by cricketers with India skipper Virat Kohli and former captain MS Dhoni bagging 63% of the total deals.
Badminton world champion PV Sindhu and boxing legend Mary Kom were the prominent non cricketers in the list of brand endorsers with the former adding four new brands to her portfolio in 2019.
Women athletes added 11 new brands in 2019, taking the tally to 45 from 34 in 2018, the report said.