BENGALURU: Indian Premier League franchise Royal Challengers Bangalore, owned by India’s biggest liquor maker United Spirits Limited, doubled its revenues in the 2018-19 financial year, despite finishing a lowly sixth among the eight teams in contention.
RCB was bought by UCL in 2008 and was made a subsidiary of the group.
RCB’s revenue doubled to Rs 3.13 billion for the financial year ending March 2019, accounting for over 10% of USL’s operating profits, Economic Times reports. In the previous financial year, the three-time finallists had accounted for only 3% of the Diageo owned liquor maker’s operating profits.
“Exponential growth in commercial partnership revenue due to a strategic shift from just monetising jersey real estate to player time cost, and moving from just ticket revenue to match-day income with initiatives aimed at increasing gross margin per seat,” Sanjeev Churiwala, chief financial officer at USL, told ET.
“Apart from high profit, RCB also helps in getting intangible benefits in terms of advertising USL brands,” Abneesh Roy, senior vice-president at Edelweiss Securities told the financial daily.
The marketability of skipper Virat Kohli has also played a significant role for advertisers and hence, RCB’s poor performances on the field has had little impact on revenues.
An IPL Brand Valuation Report by Duff & Phelps has stated: “RCB will command a premium even after not performing well largely because of Virat Kohli and also because Bangalore is a huge market for advertisers. It is their gateway to South India. Hence it is slightly insulated from their on-field performance.”
RCB earned profits for the first time in 2017 with revenues of Rs 1.62 billion.
With just 11 points from 14 games, Virat Kohli’s side finished at the bottom of the table in the 2019 edition of the IPL.
