Nike beats Adidas, Reebok to win Indian cricket team endorsement rights

BCCI emerges as biggest sports brand after Nike's 199 cr endorsement deal.

24 December 2005
MUMBAI, INDIA

The Board of Control for Cricket in India has emerged as the top sports body in the world, courtesy a windfall in sponsorship money from corporates hoping to cash in on the massive market for cricket in a nation of billion cricketing souls.

BCCI was catapulted to the elite group after American sports good major Nike piped rivals including Addidas and Reebok to win the rights to endorse its brand through Team India, by quoting a whopping Rs 196.99 crore.

Adidas had put Rs 127.50 crore, while Rebok put Rs 119.48 crore in the bidding rocess for which the minimum amount was Rs 10 lakh. The newly carved out Anil Ambani group of Reliance too was known to have bid for the endorsement contract, only to lose out to Nike’ mega offer.

The contract gives Nike endorsement rights till December 31, 2010 from first January, 2006. Of the amount Nike had pledged, Rs 94 crore is for sponsorship of non-leading arm of cricketers for four years, while the rest of the amount is for the right to be the official licensee for apparel merchandise for the BCCI. The previous contract was won by Sahara for Rs 85 crore.

Nike is expected to market replicas of the team kit worldwide.

The deal means is that the Indian cricket team will be raking in $27.12 million from sponsorship money, way ahead of even football majors Juventus, Chelsea, Real Madrid and Manchester United. 

Juventus earns $22.2 million, while Chelsea rakes in $17.5 million, star-studded Real Madrid earns $16.8 million and Manchester United gets $14 million.

The Sahara group had won the contract to sponsor Team India recently after it emerged as the highest bidder, with Rs313.80 crore. That deal struck on Monday is also for four years.

The deal covers 44 Tests and 110 ODIs plus some unscheduled days of cricket. 

The losing bidders were cellular majors Idea (Rs286 crore), Reliance Infocomm (Rs257 crore) and and Airtel (Rs251 crore) apart from Indian Oil (Rs255.9 crore).