Rather than bow immediately to negative public sentiment and drop the Chinese mobile phone manufacturer Vivo following the Galwan Valley clash between the Indian Armed forces and the People's Liberation Army of China, BCCI moved along in a measured manner to try and re-negotiate the Rs 4,000 crore deal.
Annual pay-out by Vivo was worth approximately Rs 440 crore, and if BCCI wished to cancel the contract in the present scenario, it may have ended up paying a penalty to the sponsor. Instead BCCI, despite being without a regular chief executive officer at the moment, brought the sponsor to the negotiating table and made an offer that Vivo found tough to refuse.
Given the widespread outrage in India following the unfortunate incidents on the line of actual control, Chinese companies are not really the favourites in the market. Vivo knew very well its investment would hardly pay dividends since the public was anyway looking elsewhere.
It suited both parties to agree to a one-year moratorium on the title sponsorship deal with neither side being penalised.
Of course, BCCI has been left with the unsavoury task of looking for a new title sponsor within a short period of time. And given the depressed economic scene all round, it would only be a brave company that would agree to cough up the true value of a hugely popular event like the IPL.
Faced with the tough challenge, BCCI officials have shown mature handling of the situation and have, so far, refused to buckle under pressure from the franchise owners to get a title deal in place quickly, Instead it has chosen to go the rather time-consuming route of seeking expression of interest so as to make the entire process transparent and leave little room for doubters to drag things to court.
Anyway, Vivo was reported to be unwilling to pay the full amount in the present circumstances and wanted to renegotiate. BCCI played its cards close to its chest and made sure it had a win-win deal by extending Vivo's contract by another year and neither side would hold the other liable for any breach.
Sports administrators elsewhere have a lot to learn, as has so often been the case, from BCCI's market savvy ways!
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