Indian T20 League: Another media giant gets knocked out of the race for digital media rights
The Indian Cricket Board faced a huge setback as big media giants like Amazon and Google decided to pull themselves out of the contention of the media rights of the Indian T20 League for the next cycle (2023-2027). However, as per sources of InsideSport, another big media giant, ZEE is also unwilling to BID for the PACKAGE A.
ZEE have reportedly submitted their technical BID but will not bid for PACKAGE A. It will open the race between incumbent Disney Star, Reliance Viacom18, and Sony Pictures Network. The main reason behind this pull-out has been their intention of merging with Sony. Technical Bid for this digital right may play spoil-sport for their own partner.
“No they won’t bid in the RACE” – A close source to ZEE Promoters
A close source to ZEE Promoters said that there are no chance for them to be in a bidding race with Sony as they are going to merge with them very soon. He said: “Why would ZEE Bid? Will they compete with their own partner SONY with whom they are merging very soon? No, they won’t bid in the RACE”
On Friday (10 June 2022), the legal and finance committee team of the Indian Cricket Board evaluated the technical BIDS and after that, organizations like Disney Star, Reliance Viacom18, Sony Network, Zee Entertainment, Times Internet (Only for Digital Rights), Reliance Jio (Only for Digital Rights), and SuperSport (Only for International Territory Right – PACKAGE D) qualified for the next and final round.
As per Bloomberg reports, Amazon pulled out from the contention of this digital media race as they did not want to invest more money into the Indian market. The US E-Commerce giant has already invested a huge amount of money in the Indian market. That’s why they did not find any logic behind the investment of more than $7-8 Billion into the same market. The final round of BIDDING will happen on Sunday, 12 June 2022 in Mumbai.
