(Trinidad Guardian) In an interesting development coming to hand is that the owners of the Caribbean Premier League (CPL) is allegedly looking for the buyer for the tournament.
With the league expected to get underway in the first week of August, Guardian Media understands that talks are in progress with a potential buyer from India but nothing is concrete just yet. CPL has been pumping money into the product since the inception in 2014 and is yet to turn around a profit.
What they have done though is create a product that is now a viable one and a sale at this point in time could fetch them a handsome amount, to offset the funds they would have pumped into the league.
Only last year, all six teams were picked up by owners and prior to this CPL had to bankroll the teams that had no owners. This cost a handsome amount and with regional governments not coming on board as before because of the current economic climate in the Caribbean, the business model has been struggling.
Chief Executive Officer (CEO) Damian O’donohue said that last year would have been a profitable one for the CPL but it was not. He mentioned prior to last year’s tournament that CPL had already invested US$20 million.
He added that even in the long term a realistic profit will be two to three million a year.
With the help of Indian investment the CPL has moved on from humble beginnings, when the marquee sponsors besides Digicel were an electronics store called Courts and a skin tonic called Limacol. The tournament has now attracted much juicier endorsement from Hero Motocorp, the world’s largest manufacturer of motorcycles.
That the 2015 trophy was lifted by the Trinidad & Tobago Red Steel was convenient for organisers as that franchise was recently acquired by the owners (Bollywood star Shah Rukh Khan among them) of Kolkata Knight Riders, one of the IPL sides that is as yet unaffected by the current corruption saga hampering that league.
