Mumbai: Between Star India Pvt Ltd, Sony Pictures Network Ltd (SPNL) and Reliance Jio Infocomm, the race to grab BCCI ’s bilateral media rights for the next four years began on Tuesday afternoon at 2 pm and continued till 6 pm via an e-auction process. Bidding paused at a consolidated bid of Rs 4442 cr and will resume on Wednesday at 11 am.

The drama of a closed bid – one seen last during the Indian Premier League (IPL) rights auction, for example, when Star won the consolidated rights at Rs 16,347.5 cr – was clearly missing. Instead, an online battle – inaccessible to any party outside of the bidders, BCCI and the auctioneering company – remained at play as the three bidders raised their respective submission on a cautious note.

The bid of Rs 4442 cr – recorded until 6 pm on Tuesday – ensured that the present value of

the bid so far has already gone past the previous one at which Star were contracted with BCCI between 2012 and 2018. At Rs 43 cr per match – which Star was paying BCCI in the earlier contract – a total of 102 matches would make for Rs 4386 cr.

At 10 am on Tuesday, the technical bids were submitted by all the bidding parties following which MJunction – the ecommerce company conducting the auction process – began with the bidding at 2 pm. Social media giants Facebook’s technical bid was rendered a non-starter almost a week ago – when BCCI was in the process of issuing clarifications – and the American company could now be depending on a pre-bid arrangement made with one of the three bidders.

Once the auction process began on Tuesday at an overall reserve price of Rs 4134 cr for four years, the bidding appeared to progress with one of the three parties focusing on a global consolidated bid, another focusing on a consolidated bid as well as a separate one for television rights and the third focusing on television and digital separately, while letting go of the consolidated space. Which company was bidding precisely in what manner is a detail that will remain with MJunction.

