Amazon, Reliance and other heavyweights to lock horns for India's cricket telecast rights

Amazon.com Inc and Reliance Industries Ltd (RELI.NS) are expected to take on India units of Sony Group Corp (6758.T) and Walt Disney Co (DIS.N) for bagging the telecast right to the Indian Premier League for the next five years.

Amazon has been an active participant in hosting sports at present and live streaming has shown a better development. However, it won’t’ be easy for them to win the race against their rivals oil-to-retail conglomerate Reliance Industries.

The IPL started with Sony television winning the telecast rights in the inaugural edition in 2008 and the Star network continued the winning bid until the 2017 edition despite Disney Hotstar winning the streaming rights from 2015 to 2017.

The Star network then went on to win the bidding for telecast and streaming rights from the 2018 IPL edition for the next years. Their contract expires in 2022 and it will be interesting to see who can win the bidding for the next IPL edition.

‘IPL is like its Super Bowl’ – Anton Rublievskyi

Anton Rublievskyi, head of Parimatch, a betting company noted the importance of making business with cricket as it holds the liking of almost two and a half billion fans. He added that it is tough to survive without getting involved with the sport, especially in India.

Star India, who won the last bidding for IPL telecast rights, have paid 163.48 billion rupees for the digital and television rights until 2022 and they were repaid the faith with 350 million viewers in the first phase of IPL 2021 alone.

“Cricket is the second-biggest sport in the world with two-and-a-half billion fans and IPL is like its Super Bowl,” said Anton Rublievskyi, head of Parimatch that advertised at the IPL last year “If you’re not there, you do not exist.”

Star India recently live-streamed the IPL 2022 mega auction in Bengaluru on February 12 and 13. Meanwhile, for Amazon to be handed over the telecast rights and streaming rights, they will need a Television partner and there have been talks over their intentions to join hands with Sony India which is going to be tough as well.