The Athletic<\/em> last month<\/a>, global sports marketing firm Two Circles boss Gareth Balch said: \u201cThis century, if you look at the top 20 global sports, cricket has been the fastest growing, and it is almost all to do with T20, its most simple and accessible format.<\/p>\n\u201cThe IPL is the biggest shooting star in global sport. The league\u2019s franchise valuations have grown by a multiple of 10 since it launched, and that\u2019s underpinned by the number of cricket fans.<\/p>\n
\u201cDemographics are destiny when it comes to sports investments, and India is looking like the best destiny.\u201d<\/p>\n
Having overtaken China in 2023, India\u2019s population is 1.47 billion people, 18 per cent of the global total. And it now has the world\u2019s fifth largest economy. No other sport comes close to cricket\u2019s popularity in India or any of its South Asian neighbours.<\/p>\n
\u201cRCB has a world-class fanbase, and the IPL is one of the great growth stories in global sport,\u201d Blitzer said in a press release on Tuesday.<\/p>\n
\u201cHaving invested in clubs and leagues around the world, I believe the opportunity at RCB stands out. We look forward to working alongside our partners and the (Board of Control for Cricket in India) to build on the franchise\u2019s championship success.\u201d<\/p>\n
Formerly known as Bangalore, Bengaluru is the capital of the southern Indian state Karnataka. Last year\u2019s IPL title was RCB\u2019s first, having lost three previous finals. Having won the Women\u2019s Premier League (WPL) in 2024, they won it again in February, becoming the first franchise to hold both the men\u2019s and women\u2019s crowns at the same time.<\/p>\n
Blitzer is not the first American sports investor to spot the IPL\u2019s potential, though, as RedBird Capital Partners, the New York-based private equity firm founded by AC Milan owner and Fenway Sports Group (FSG) investor Gerry Cardinale, bought a stake in the Rajasthan Royals in 2021.<\/p>\n
However, the Royals have also been on the market and, according to reports in India, it looks like an American group led by Arizona-based investor Kal Somani has bought the 2008 champions for $1.63bn (\u00a31.22bn).<\/p>\n
Somani is an existing shareholder but he has teamed up with Walmart billionaire Rob Walton, the owner of the NFL\u2019s Denver Broncos, and Sheila Ford Hamp, the owner of the Detroit Lions and a member of the Ford family, to buy out RedBird, media tycoon Rupert Murdoch\u2019s son Lachlan and British-Indian businessman Manoj Badale.<\/p>\n
Their apparent success would mean that Avram Glazer, who own slices of Manchester United and the Tampa Bay Buccaneers, missed out again on his attempt to buy an IPL team, having been outbid for the two expansion franchises in 2021 and missed out on both RCB and the Royals this time.<\/p>\n
Somani, Walton and Hamp Ford are already partners in Motor City Golf Club, one of the franchises in the indoor golf league created by Tiger Woods, Rory McIlroy and the PGA Tour.<\/p>\n
The Athletic<\/em> has asked Somani, Walton, Hamp Ford and the Rajasthan Royals for comment.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n \u2018 The preceding article may include information circulated by third parties \u2019 <\/em><\/p>\n \u2018 Some details of this article were extracted from the following source www.nytimes.com \u2019 <\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"David Blitzer, the first man to own stakes in teams from all five of the biggest sports leagues in the United States, is part of a group that has bought Indian cricket franchise Royal Challengers Bengaluru (RCB) in a deal worth $1.78billion (\u00a31.33bn). Blitzer sold his stake in Major League Soccer\u2019s Real Salt Lake last […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":2344356,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"jnews-multi-image_gallery":[],"jnews_single_post":[],"jnews_primary_category":[],"jnews_social_meta":[],"footnotes":""},"categories":[43],"tags":[26230,454713,399588],"class_list":["post-2344355","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-royalty","tag-cricket","tag-global-sports","tag-sports-business"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/IPL-champions-Royal-Challengers-Bengaluru-sold-to-new-ownership-group.jpg","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2344355","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2344355"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2344355\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2344357,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2344355\/revisions\/2344357"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2344356"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2344355"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2344355"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2344355"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}