Seven franchises from the Indian Premier League (IPL) iconic domestic cricket competition have reportedly expressed interest in buying stakes in teams from The Hundred, the English short-format league.
It has been reported that the Chennai Super Kings (India Cements), Sunrisers Hyderabad (Sun Group), Lucknow Super Giants (RPSG Group), Mumbai Indians (Reliance Industries), Kolkata Knight Riders (Shah Rukh Khan and Juhi Chawla), Rajasthan Royals (Manoj Badale), and Delhi Capitals (the JSW and GMR groups), have all submitted bids.
The deadline for first-round bids by entities interested in taking stakes in the eight city-based franchises was October 18, with the England and Wales Cricket Board (ECB) now evaluating the initial responses.
Sportcal (GlobalData Sport) understands - it has also been heavily reported - that the Mumbai Indians are most interested in buying a stake in London Spirit, one of two teams based in the English capital.
The overall process went live in early September, with the ECB giving away 51% of each franchise from The Hundred to the professional county whose ground is used by that particular team. They are, therefore, only looking to sell 49% of the teams, at least initially, to private equity.
However, the counties may themselves then choose to sell a portion of their allocated stake to private investors.
Other groups reported to have submitted first-round bids include Lancer Capitals, the vehicle of Avram Glazer (part-owner of soccer’s Manchester United), and Dubai-based Capri Global Group.
There is as yet no requirement for bidders to select which of the eight teams they wish to invest in - they can express interest in up to four - with those decisions to be made in the second and third round.
The ECB is, according to various media reports, looking to secure bids that would give each team a valuation of between £75 million ($97.6 million) and £100 million.
The cricket body sent around 100 prospectuses to potential stake buyers last month, with the process being assisted by Deloitte and the Raine Group.
Richard Thompson, chair of the ECB, has been quoted by ESPNCricinfo as saying: “Raine originally said they thought there'd be three to four bidders per team. The investment base is way broader and bigger than they expected."
In terms of timescale, while the ECB is hoping to have all sales wrapped up by the start of the 2025 English cricket season next April, it has said it will not rush to do so if the bids made by that point are not deemed to be sufficient.
Richard Gould, the ECB’s chief executive, has also commented on the sale process, saying: “We are confident in our product, in terms of the window we occupy and the players we've got available. There are loads of T20 and short-format franchise competitions out there at the moment, and I don't think they are all going to last, in truth.”
However, late last month the ECB’s projected valuations of the tournament in future years as a whole came under attack from Lalit Modi, an original founder of the IPL.
In a lengthy post on X (formerly Twitter), in which he posted several images of what were claimed to be the ECB’s valuations of the teams, he described the overall ECB approach and financial projections as “disconnected from reality.”
With private investment in the teams, The Hundred will join the long list of Twenty20 leagues worldwide where teams are privately owned - the SA20 in South Africa, the Caribbean Premier League, the ILT20 in the United Arab Emirates, and most prominently the IPL, are some high-profile examples.
The Hundred, established in 2021, recently completed its fourth season.
