ICC Media Rights Auctions – Unhappy Broadcasters ready to boycott AUCTION? Each passing day is bringing in more troubles for International Cricket Council (ICC) Media Rights Tender. The ‘lack of transparency’ issue earlier reported by InsideSport has snowballed into huge controversy for the ICC Tender. InsideSport has learnt that some of the top broadcasters are even planning to boycott the media rights tender submission scheduled for August 22nd: Follow ICC Media Rights Tender LIVE Updates & Sports Business News LIVE with InsideSport.IN
“ICC officials have made a mess of this. The answers to our queries have made it more confusing for us. All their answers are ambiguous. We asked them who qualifies for the STAGE 2? What is the criteria? They don’t have clear cut answers. Our board may decide to boycott the tender completely. We may unfortunately have to take that course”, confirmed very agitated Senior official of one of the top broadcast house from India to InsideSport.
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ICC Media Rights Auctions: Top India broadcasters can boycott MEDIA RIGHTS Tender, worried ICC reaches E-Auction company’s DOORS: Follow LIVE UPDATES
ICC Media Rights Tender – Who are in fray? India’s top four broadcast networks Disney Star, Zee Entertainment Enterprises (ZEE), Sony Pictures Networks India (SPN), and Viacom18 are the prime contenders for the rights.
Other than this Dream11 parent company promoted FanCode and Amazon Prime Video have also picked tender documents.
The bidders are not satisfied with the clarifications provided by the world cricket governing body last week. They have expressed their strong disapproval of the proposed adoption of a hybrid system for the bidding process.
What is making broadcasters unhappy? The prime reason of discontentment is that ‘Tender process is not fair and document is ambiguous at various places’. According to available information with InsideSport the broadcasters had asked for clarifications on more than 200 points.
On August 5, the broadcasters had received responses from the ICC Business Corporation. But that had made the matter worse.
What are broadcasters asking?
- The broadcasters had asked for an e-auction.
- Or they want that bids should open on the same day – that is on the day of Submission. As per the current tender document, ICC instead will be opening the bid 4 days later on August 26th.
- Also the broadcasters are of the view that the bids should be opened in presence of all bidders.
However, the ICC has suggested a hybrid system. This means 1ST after submission of bids on August 22nd, the evaluation group of ICC will check the bids and see whether to present the bids to ICC Board or not.
Once that is decided, ICC will trigger the e-auction round 2 process (EAR2P).
ICC Media Rights Auctions: Top India broadcasters can boycott MEDIA RIGHTS Tender, worried ICC reaches E-Auction company’s DOORS: Follow LIVE UPDATES
Meanwhile, the worried ICC has already started knocking on the doors of an e-auction company. ICC has reached out to Mjunction, the company which had conducted the IPL E-auction for the BCCI.
The bid submission deadline for ICC Media Rights is now less than two weeks away and the situation is alarming for the world body.
ICC Media Rights Tender Process
- Bids Submission: The bids must be submitted on August 22 via sealed envelope.
- Bids Opening: Bids will be opened on August 26 in Dubai (last time they were opened in London).
- ICC will then individually negotiate with the bidders
- According to the ICC, the successful bidders will be announced by early September.
- Bidders have raised FLAG over closed bid process as they feel it lacks transparency.
ICC Media Rights Tender: The ICC launched the 2024-31 cycle tender for the India territory on June 20. The tender is being conducted for both four and eight-years periods.
Interested parties have to mandatorily bid for four years with the option of placing a claim for eight years as well. One can bid for the television rights and digital rights separately as well as place a composite bid for both the rights.
The bids must be submitted on August 22 and they will be opened on August 26 in Dubai. The ICC said the successful bidders will be announced by early September. All top four broadcasters in the country i.e DisneyStar, SPN, Zee Entertainment Enterprises (ZEE), and Viacom18 are expected to bid for the rights. According to information available with InsideSport, all 4 have bought the tender docuements.
Follow ICC MEDIA Rights Auction LIVE Updates with InsideSport.IN
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