Viacom18 Bags Packages B And C As IPL Digital Rights Rake In More Than TV: Sources

It has been a big pay day for the Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) as the lucrative media rights for the Indian Premier League has raked in the expected billions for the cricket board. After the fate of the all important packages A (TV rights) and B (Digital rights) were decided on Monday, broadcasters slugged it out for package C, which has a select non-exclusive rights deal.

According to sources, Reliance's Viacom18, won the rights for package C with a Rs 3,273 crore winning bid. As a result of this, Viacom, who also won the rights for Package B with a pay out of Rs 20,500 crore (Rs 50 crore per match for 410 matches), ended up paying Rs 23,773 crore for the entire bouquet of digital rights.

This figure is slightly more than what Disney Star paid (Rs 23,575 crore) to retain their TV telecast rights, according to sources.

The big headline from this IPL media rights auction was the emergence of digital as the big brother, as it trumped the amount that was paid for the TV rights. The value of each IPL match based on these numbers currently stands at a little over Rs 115 crore.

In the end it was the BCCI that laughed its way to the bank, raking in a total sum of Rs 47,348 crore for the packages A, B and C.

This is nearly three times the amount that it had received for the previous 5-year cycle for the media rights as Star had paid Rs 16,347.50 in September 2017 to win the global rights (TV and digital).

Promoted

In 2008, Sony Pictures Network won the IPL media rights for a period of 10 years with a bid of Rs 8200 crore. The global digital rights of IPL for a period of three years were awarded to Novi Digital in 2015 for 302.2 crore.

The tournament was expanded from eight teams to ten teams this year with