Indian Premier League: The Big Fat Indian Brand

Duff & Phelps, a premier global valuation and corporate finance advisor with expertise in complex valuation, has published their third edition of the annual study of Brand Values in the Indian Premier League (IPL).

The report ranked the franchise brand values for six teams in the Indian Premier League (Gujarat Lions and Rising Pune Supergiant were excluded from the study due to the lack of their association with the Indian Premier League beyond season 10 as CSK and RR are expected to make a comeback after serving their suspension) based upon a relief from royalty analysis coupled with an assessment of six other factors, including:  1.management strength and on-field performance, 2. Marketing strategy, 3. Celebrity influence and marquee players, 4. geographical location, 5. Governance and transparency and 6. Social media engagement.

Some Key findings from the study include:

1. Total value of the IPL has grown from US $3.5 billion to reach US $4.2 billion over the last five quarters. The total value of IPL has thus grown by 19%.
2. Mumbai Indians had the highest brand value in the IPL(US $78mn in 2016)
3. Royal Challengers Bangalore were the biggest gainers with their brand value increasing by 31%, while Kings XI Punjab were the biggest losers with the brand value depreciating by 24%.

According to Varun Gupta (Managing Director Duffs & Phelps India)

“Over the years, we have seen multiple instances of scandals surrounding the premier sporting event of the country, but in almost every single year, the IPL has come out stronger and more popular than before.

However, this year the added bonus and a major boost to the Brand IPL has seen a controversy-free IPL season. Also, the IPL Fan Parks initiative, which saw footfalls of 15,000 to 20,000 spectators every weekend, was a huge hit in the Tier 2 and Tier 3 cities.

The other initiatives such as Twitter match hashtag trends, IPL Selfie trends, player battles and the Facebook “Support Your Team” initiative also ensured that the fans were hooked on the IPL.”

Besides the Royal Challengers Bangalore, who gained an increase of 31% in their brand value over the value last year, Sunrisers Hyderabad have also been big gainers with an increase of nearly 17% in their brand value.

KXIP were the biggest losers with a depreciation of 24% in their brand value and accompanying them were KKR, losing out 10% of their last years brand value.

“The Vivo title sponsorship deal was 26% higher than the Pepsi deal. Sony completely sold out its ad slots for the IPL season even before the first ball of the tournament was bowled (despite hiking ad rates by nearly 15%). These along with the recent news of Hotstar’s viewership touching 100 million (a jump of nearly 45% from the previous season), suggest that Brand IPL’s popularity is not only intact but is in fact increasing.”

Added Varun Gupta.

here are the numbers on the social media front:

well, with these numbers, IPL is sure one of the big fat Indian brands!