EXCLUSIVE: Tatas set to get right-to-match the highest bid for 2024 IPL title sponsorship

The Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) has favourably considered a request by the Tatas for a long-term association with the Indian Premier League (IPL) and would offer India’s top industrial conglomerate a right-to-match a higher offer in bids for the title sponsorship for 2024-28.
 
Sources have told Business Today that Tata Group has proposed a long-term association, preferably for over five years, to the BCCI for India’s top sporting league.
 
The current assignment, announced earlier this week, is for the residual two-year period of the Vivo title sponsorship. Once this period gets over in 2023, the BCCI will issue a fresh tender to discover the price for new title sponsorship.
 
Details accessed by Business Today state that, “considering the request made by Tata for a five-year association, we can consider giving a right-to-match to Tata when BCCI tenders the title sponsor rights for 2024-28."
 
A query sent to the Tata Group went unanswered.
 
This implies that the Tatas will be given a right to match the highest offer during bidding for the next five-year sponsorship period beginning in 2024. This would mean that the BCCI will face no loss of revenue in continuing with the House of Tatas as the sponsor of India’s most-watched sporting tournament.
 
Such a right-to-match is not without precedent. In the past when real estate major DLF was the title sponsor from 2008-12, BCCI’s contract with the company had a clause that allowed the two parties to negotiate in good faith for extending the rights period for five years after the final match of the final season.
 
BCCI officials have also noted that a multi-brand sponsorship by Tata will not cause any monetary loss to the board. This is in view of the Tata Group requesting the cricket body that it be permitted to activate two categories on an exclusive basis from their large stable of brands and change the same from season to season during the upcoming two-year sponsorship period.

This too has precedent, as the BCCI has in the past allowed other sponsors who operated in multiple categories to activate more than one brand.
 
Windfall gain for BCCI from Tata sponsorship
 
A detailed breakup of the Tata offer shows that the conglomerate will pay a rights fee of Rs 301 crore each for 2022 and 2023 (a total of Rs 602 crore). In addition, the group will pay an “incremental fee for additional matches” of Rs 34 crore each in the two years (a total of Rs 68 crore).
 
On its part, the fee payable by Vivo is Rs 183 crore for 2022 and Rs 211 crore for 2023 (a total of Rs 394 crore). In addition, the mobile handset brand will also shell out a 6 per cent assignment fee of Rs 29 crore this year, and Rs 31 crore next year.
 
As a result, the BCCI will cumulatively receive a total of Rs 1124 crore for the remaining two seasons, nearly 12.85 per cent higher than the Rs 996 crore it would have received had Vivo continued with the sponsorship.

Also read: Tata Group to replace Vivo as IPL title sponsor from this year: Brijesh Patel