IPL franchise Kolkata Knight Riders' growth rate faster than Manchester United

According to a survey carried out by the Broadcast Audience Research Council of India, IPL franchise Kolkata Knight Riders is currently the fastest growing sporting franchise in the world.

The report from based on the collected data states Kolkata Knight Riders (KKR) registered a  300% annual growth last year, close to 100% ahead of popular English Premier League franchise Manchester United – who grew 204% in 2015/16.

The Indian Premier League (IPL) has a game changer for the BCCI as well as for world cricket. The league itself is said to be valued at a staggering 4.5 billion or simply said Rs, 27,000 Crores.

The survey says the 2016 IPL was a bumper hit. The statistics are wonderful. 52% of the TV viewing households watched the tournament, with the league’s cumulative TV reach being 361 million viewers.

1,543,655 spectators went to watch the matches on the ground, while 4,40,000 people paid a visit to the ‘fanparks,’ an initiative taken by the BCCI to popularise the league in tier-2 cities.

“According to the Broadcast Audience Research Council of India, the total TV viewership of IPL 2016 calculated by impressions stood at 102 crores. A report by management consultancy firm KPMG puts the total impact of IPL 2015 on the Indian economy at Rs 1,150 crore, more than 0.6 % of the country’s GDP,” states the report.

The BCCI has claimed that the net viewership of the league has hit the 100 million mark. The `Summer Slam’ is leading the charts on the social media too, as per the survey. At 300%, its growth on Twitter is the fastest among all the top sporting leagues of the world since 2014 – the UEFA Champions League is next with 239%, with NFL (125%), NBA (99%) and MSL (75%) following it. According to it, at 300%, the Kolkata Knight Riders, in the past two years, is recording a faster growth on Twitter than even Manchester United (204%) — one of the most popular football clubs of the world.