BCCI and IPL strike website deal with US firm for $50m

New Delhi, March 26 (IANS) By August, the Indian cricket board and its prestigious offshoot Indian Premier League (IPL) will have fully functional websites, to be built by a US company, a deal fetching them $50 million, a board official said Wednesday.

The deal for both portals has been finalised, but a formal announcement about it would be made only in April, before the cash-rich IPL kicks off April 18, said the official.

The Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) is not disclosing the name of the listed company as it is still in the process of completing the formalities.

While both portals will be launched in April, they are expected to start functioning partially in July. They will be fully functional after their formal launch in August. The revenue will be split on a 50:50 between the BCCI and the US company.

Although the BCCI has a website -- www.bcci.tv -- it only has a static board emblem to show and nothing more. The IPL also has a web address -- www.indianpremierleague.com -- but here too the information is basic and largely for its eight franchisees, like the buyers' prospectus etc.

Once the two websites become functional, the BCCI will launch its mobile service.

Team Pawar has been promising a fully functional website ever since it came to power. It took well over four months for it to seal the deal after calling for bids.

The website project, however, took a backseat as the officials turned their focus on the lucrative and glamorous IPL Twenty20 tournament that has already fetched the BCCI billions of dollars.

The board's marketing sub-committee, headed by Lalit Modi, is handling the website project.

The BCCI is the only one among the 10 Test-playing countries that does not have a website.

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