Mumbai: The number of advertisers on the opening day telecast of the Indian Premier League (IPL) this year was 40% less than the number of advertisers on the opening day last year. While there were 52 advertisers on board for IPL’s opening fixture on TV last year, this year that number for the opening fixture was 31 for live matches only (all channels).

The advertisers data has been verified through BARC numbers. The data is for all TV feeds where IPL is being telecast. with the usual big spenders giving TV a miss this time around. The absence of some big spenders on TV from last year’s IPL, such as Byjus, Cred, Muthoot, Netmeds, Swiggy, Flipkart, Phone Pe, Meesho, Samsung, OnePlus, Vedantu, Spotify, Havells

The outcome has aligned with the expert opinion on MediaNews4U article dated January 2023: IPL 2023: Will free-stream on Jio woo audiences away from Star Sports , in which practitioner predicted that the ad inventory that TV commanded might come down.

Disney Star is the TV broadcasting rights holder of Indian Premier League. The international media giant spent $3 billion on TV rights for the period between 2023-2027.

The total number of advertisers on TV for IPL last year was around 100. And the number of TV sponsors has sharply decreased from 16 last year to 13 (as claimed by the broadcaster) this year till the opening match.

In terms of TV ad rates for IPL, sources from media agencies revealed that, it has witnessed considerable drop due to the stiff competition and unfavourable market conditions.