IPL draws huge bids to own teams

Franchises to invest $723.6 million over a period of ten years

The much-hyped Indian Premier League (IPL) has engrossed mega bucks thorough the bidding process of said eight teams since sky is the limit and once it completed, all of a sudden IPL turned into (BBC), as for now IPL stands for Business, Bollywood and in the end it's Cricket.

All the top Corporates from across the country showed its power and passion for cricket by investing $723.6 million to earn the right of eight Indian Premier League (IPL) Twenty20 teams for ten years.

It's not just cricket they all are looking at but it's more a business deal in a new yet strong prosperous sector which will be a rich source of generating money in the years to come. The board is launching the Indian Premier League, a national Twenty20 competition with teams owned and managed by companies, in April.

According to BCCI Secretary Niranjan Shah, the BCCI had sold the rights to the Mumbai team to Mukesh Ambani's Reliance Industries for $111.9m, Red Chillies Entertainment (Shah Rukh Khan, Juhi Chawla and Jay Mehta) won the Kolkata region at $75.09 million and Bangalore went to liquor baron Vijay Mallya's UB Group for $111.6m.

The Deccan Chronicle Group won the Hyderabad region at $107.01 million; Indian Cements won the Chennai region at $91 million while GMR Holdings won the Delhi region at $84 million.

A group comprising Bollywood actress Priety Zinta, Ness Wadia, Karan Paul and Mohit Burman (Dabur) won the Mohali region at $76 million, and Emerging Media won the Jaipur region at $67 million.

Mukesh Ambani’s group had bid for all the regions with varied sums, and his maximum bid was $111.9 million while Vijay Mallya’s highest bid was $111.6 million.

Once RIL got Mumbai region, its other bids got cancelled. In that case Mallya’s UB group, which was running hard to get Mumbai region, had to content with Bangalore region.

According to Lalit Modi, Vice-President (BCCI), and Chairman and Commissioner of IPL, apart form the above eight, the bids were received from real estate group DLF, Deutsche Bank and Anil Ambani’s Emerald Telecoms.

The players’ auction, which was to take place on February 7, has been postponed. “We will consult the eight franchisees after which we will announce the date of the player auction,” he said.

The player auction will allow each franchisee to bid for the players of Team India, BCCI contracted players and the overseas players contracted by the board.

A franchisee will only be allowed to bid for eight overseas players. The IPL has contracted about 80 international players.

All the franchisees have now got the right to market their sponsorship with the tournament is going to commence on April 18. A total of 59 matches will be played over 44 days with two matches will be played on Saturdays and Sundays. All the teams will play their matches on home and away basis.

The procedural support for conducting the tournament will be provided by the International Cricket Council (ICC). The competition will be played under the ICC Twenty20 rules and the teams have a binding of all the rules related to ICC’s anti-doping, anti-corruption and anti-racism policies.