

Explainer: Why is IPL suffering from a ‘monetization gap’?
The 19th edition of the Indian Premier League (IPL) begins this weekend, where all eyes will be on the defending champions Royal Challengers Bengaluru, who clinched their first ever win last year. Meanwhile, there are big-name investors, including Temasek, EQT, Premji Invest, Adar Poonawalla and a couple of US-based sports investors, vying for stake in the Rajasthan Royals and Royal Challengers teams.
Besides team owners, advertisers and broadcasters are also keeping an eye on how the economics of the IPL plays out.However, even as earning from avenues such as advertising and team sponsorships continues to grow, data shows media rights revenues are still under pressure. As a new media rights cycle will begin in 2028, media consulting firm Media Partners Asia says the league continues to suffer from a “monetization gap”.
What is this gap, and why does it persist? Mint explainsPer data from WPP Media’s ‘Sporting Nation’ report released this month, team sponsorship revenue for the IPL crossed a landmark to reach ₹1,033 crore in 2025. This, the report said, validated the economics of IPL’s franchise model, and showed that team jerseys are pulling in big advertisers.
Also, cricket has begun attracting newer deep-pocketed advertisers to its lineup, including Big Tech who are replacing the big spending done by now-banned real money gaming companies.Media research and consulting firm Media Partners Asia (MPA) said in a report this month that this season onwards, it expects much more advertising by Big Tech AI platforms, such as from Google’s Gemini and OpenAI’s ChatGPT.Money from streaming or broadcasting the IPL is not coming in as it should. According to data from the MPA report quoted above, India’s Pay TV subscriber base
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