The Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) earlier released the tender to invite bids for the Kit and merchandising rights of the Indian Cricket Team. Puma and Adidas were considered to be the front-runners, but eventually decided not to submit their bids! This came in as a shocker and embarrassment for the board.
Invitation to Tender (ITT) was released after Nike decided to discontinue with the deal, although BCCI offered the deal to Nike at a lower premium than before. Initially Nike was paying Rs.370 Cr and additional Rs.30 Cr as premium for the kit rights, but now owing to the pandemic and the financial situation the base price has been reduced by 31%.
For the new three-year rights cycle, BCCI set Rs 8 crore as the base price for the merchandise partner and Rs 65 lakh per match for kit sponsorship. During the next three years, the Indian cricket team is supposed to play 142 matches. At the base price, a bidder would have to shell out a minimum of Rs 116.3 crore over the next three years, apart from supplying over 30,000 kits per year to the BCCI.
SportsMint has learnt from its reliable sources that, apart from Adidas and Puma, Dream Sports, Universal Sportsbiz (owner of WROGN) and the Walt Disney also picked up the tender documents and showed interest in bidding.
Considering no bids, BCCI has decided to extend the deadline to invite bids for Kit sponsor and merchandising rights.