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indiantelevision.com Team
MUMBAI: Kalanithi Maran-owned media conglomerate Sun TV Network on Thursday won the Hyderabad Indian Premier League (IPL) franchise putting in the highest bid that was 23 per cent more than the second bid for the same team.
Sun bid Rs 850.5 million a year while the next bid was for Rs 690.3 million from PVP Ventures, which had earlier bid a whopping Rs 9.0 billion for buying the sacked, financially-distressed Hyderabad team Deccan Chargers.
The earlier Hyderabad franchise owned by Deccan Chronicle Holdings Ltd (DCHL) still had five years to go under the contract with Indian Premier League (IPL), when it failed to get a respite from both the Bombay High Court and the Supreme Court to get its termination stayed earlier this month.
Sun will get to own the franchise for a period of five years till 2017 paying Rs 4.25 billion as franchise fee to the Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI).
When DCHL?s Deccan Chargers won the bid for its Hyderabad team in January 2008, it had committed to pay $107 million (Rs 4.21 billion) over a period of 10 years which worked out to $10.7 million (Rs 421 million) per year at the rupee-dollar exchange rate prevalent in January 2008.
From 2018, Sun will own the yet-to-be named franchise in perpetuity and will pay 20 per cent of the franchise revenue every year as fee to the BCCI.
According to an IPL Governing Council member, Sun TV has paid Rs 200 million as performance guarantee and Rs 850.5 million as bank guarantee for the 2013 when the company will make its IPL debut.
"Sun TV Network has won the Hyderabad Franchise for an amount of Rs 85.05 crores (Rs 855.5 million) per year. This Franchise fee represents a premium of over a 100 per cent above the amount paid by DCHL for the Hyderabad Franchise in 2008," BCCI secretary Sanjay Jagdale said in a statement.
"The Sun TV Network bid was substantially higher than the second bid of PVP Ventures, which was Rs 69.03 crores (Rs 690.3 million)," he added.
The IPL Governing Council met earlier today in Mumbai to open the bids for a new IPL Franchise. The BCCI had on 14 October invited bids for adding the ninth IPL team after the exit of Deccan Chargers and had opened up the bidding for any of the 10 cities including Ahmedabad, Vizag, Hyderabad and Noida. The response to the bidding was lukewarm as Sun TV and PVP Ventures were the only two bidders and both bid for Hyderabad.
Sun will also have the right to sign existing Deccan Chargers players. The players who are not signed by their existing franchises will go into the auction pool.
The franchises have to sign contracts with existing players before the 31 October deadline.
Also Read: New IPL valuation set by Sun TV to deter deals
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