ESPN STAR Sports, the official broadcaster of the ICC T20 World Cup, has sold the entire ad inventory for the tournament, which opened on Tuesday and would be on till October 7 in Sri Lanka. For the event, the channel has roped in 10 sponsors — three joint presenting sponsors and seven associates. Overall, 34 advertisers have signed up for the tournament.
According to industry sources, ESPN STAR Sports had targeted ad revenue of Rs 240 crore from the event, a rise of about 50 per cent over the revenue from previous T20 World Cup, aired on the channel two years earlier. For ESPN STAR Sports, which operates a clutch of channels, including STAR Cricket, STAR Cricket HD, STAR Sports and ESPN, the T20 cricket World Cup is most rewarding, in terms of advertising revenue.
While Reliance Communications, Havells India and Hero MotoCorp have come on board as joint presenting sponsors, Tata Motors, PepsiCo, Nokia India, Pernod Ricard, Hyundai Motor India, Tata Teleservices and Union Bank of India are the associate sponsors. Other advertisers have also been signed up for pre and post-match programming.
ESPN STAR Sports also said it had tied up with value-added service provider DigiVive for live streaming of the tournament on mobile phones. DigiVive has also secured the rights for video streaming of the broadcaster’s highlights programmes, according to a company statement.
ESPN Software India Executive Vice-President Sanjay Kailash said, “We are delighted with the advertiser response on the broadcast of the ICC T20 World Cup. We are completely sold-out. A total of 10 sponsors, including three joint presenting and seven associate sponsors have come on board. This is the fourth edition of the ICC T20 World Cup we are broadcasting and definitely, the best ever in terms of advertising revenues.”
Though ESPN STAR Sports officials refused to comment on the ad rates, media buyers said the company had signed deals at an ad rate of about Rs 3.5 lakh per 10 seconds for all the 27 matches to be aired on Star Cricket and Star Cricket HD.
“This (the T20 World Cup) will definitely be more exciting and will get more ratings than the previous one, as it being played in the Subcontinent. The timing is better for Indian audiences and there is an appetite for cricket. Also, the response of advertisers is quite high this time,” said Anamika Mehta, chief operating officer, Lodestar UM.