ICC media rights on hold as world body waits for BCCI's IPL tender; industry pushes for Netflix & YouTube models - report

ICC media rights on hold as world body waits for BCCI's IPL tender; industry pushes for Netflix & YouTube models - report originally appeared on Cricket News. Add Cricket News as a Preferred Source by clicking here.

KEY TAKEAWAYS:

The ICC's media rights tender will only be reportedly released after the BCCI first launches its own IPL rights tender, which remains on hold.

Industry executives are pushing the BCCI to explore Netflix, YouTube and Amazon-style rights models rather than relying solely on traditional broadcasters.

BCCI secretary Devajit Saikia sits on the ICC's five-member media rights working group being headed by ECB chief Richard Thompson.

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Netflix, YouTube & a new blueprint! Why BCCI's delay in IPL media rights sale has left broadcasters in limbo - explained

ICC's media rights tender has hit a peculiar bottleneck, and the BCCI is reportedly at the centre of it.

According to The Times of India, the ICC last week set up a five-member working group tasked with exploring how to maximise the value of its 2028-31 media rights cycle. But before that process can move forward, the world governing body has to sit and wait, as a tender cannot go to market until the BCCI releases its IPL media rights document first.

The ICC's media rights working group, chaired by ECB chief Richard Thompson along with ICC chairman Jay Shah and BCCI secretary Devajit Saikia among its members, has been put together with a clear mandate: figure out how to either hold or improve the current value of ICC broadcast deals as they come up for renewal.

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But the sequencing of how rights go to market matters enormously in cricket. The IPL is the most valuable domestic cricket property on the planet, and its rights cycle sets the benchmark for pricing, for platform strategy, for what broadcasters and technology companies are willing to commit to. The ICC can't price or structure its own rights without understanding what the IPL market looks like first.

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BCCI yet to appoint financial advisor for IPL tender

The last time BCCI went through this process, in 2022, it brought in KPMG to draft the IPL tender document. That document contained something innovative: a non-exclusive digital rights package covering a curated selection of 18 high-value matches per season within a 74-game structure.

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Set in the Indian subcontinent, that specific package alone fetched Rs 3,273 crore, working out to Rs 33.24 crore per match. For the first time in IPL history, internet rights generated more revenue from the subcontinent than traditional television rights.

That was a landmark moment, and yet, four years on, the BCCI hasn't appointed a financial advisory firm to begin the work for the next cycle. Industry executives watching developments say they had expected the board to move quickly, particularly given how the technology landscape has shifted.

"We were expecting to hear something from them on this. Given the way tech is changing how we consume sport, we thought the board would be keen to explore these changing revenue patterns and models for IPL," one industry executive told the Times of India. "Look at the YouTube sports-bundling model in the US, for instance. The NFL Sunday Ticket is a case study in itself."

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(Getty Images)

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Industry calls for Netflix, Amazon and YouTube to be brought into the conversation

The broader argument being made by sports industry executives is that the BCCI is sitting on a commercial opportunity it hasn't fully explored.

The IPL is already a premium product, but the way it's currently monetised, which is heavily centralised around JioStar for live broadcasts, leaves significant value sitting on the table, in the view of those watching closely.

One IPL franchise executive described the current model's risk and said: "Perhaps not a very healthy model either, considering all your eggs happen to be in one single basket."

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The alternative being discussed is a modular approach, separating live rights from non-live content, archival value, highlights, regional storytelling, fan engagement platforms and documentary content, and offering each to the platforms best positioned to monetise them.

Netflix, Amazon and YouTube haven't made major moves into live Indian sport, but executives argue that's partly because the BCCI hasn't gone to them.

Netflix, while not offering live sport as a standard subscription feature, has been selectively building live and event-based content into its model to give subscribers reasons to stay. That evolution makes them a more credible conversation partner than they would have been even two or three years ago.

The timing of this conversation is not accidental, as BCCI members are convening in Mumbai from Friday for the Annual General Meeting, and those tracking media rights developments are watching closely to see whether the IPL tender process, and the broader question of platform strategy, makes its way onto the agenda.

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BCCI's caution over IPL media rights might be a rare miscalculation

The BCCI is many things, but slow is rarely one of them when commercial interests are on the line. The delay in appointing a financial advisor for the IPL rights tender, particularly when consumption models are shifting this rapidly, feels out of character.

The 2022 cycle delivered a landmark result partly because KPMG's work helped the board understand what the market could bear and structure the tender accordingly. Doing that same groundwork early, before platforms are courted, before NDAs are signed, before rival leagues set their own timelines, is how you maximise value.

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The modular argument is the one that deserves the most attention. Bundling everything into a single broadcaster may have made sense when linear television was the dominant medium. It looks increasingly risky now that a significant share of sports viewership, particularly among younger demographics, is happening on YouTube, over-the-top platforms and short-form content destinations.

If Netflix, Amazon or YouTube can be brought into a partial non-live package for IPL content, the overall revenue picture changes. The BCCI has the leverage, but it needs to decide it's ready to use it.

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