Reliance Jio has signed a five-year contract with Star India for non-exclusive streaming rights of cricket matches hosted by the Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI). Star Sports’ digital platform Hotstar will continue to stream the matches. With this, the Jio TV subscribers will now have an access to the television broadcast of the matches that are hosted by the BCCI.
Star India holds the media rights for matches hosted by the BCCI. The country’s largest sports broadcasting network had retained the board’s absolute media rights for five years (2018-2023) for a record ₹6,138 crore in April. India will be hosting the ICC World Cup in 2023.
As per the reports in InsideSport, in a statement Reliance Jio said, “Jio and Star will make all televised India-cricket matches available to users of JioTV and Hotstar in India. Reliance Industries Limited signed an agreement in this regard with Star India Pvt Ltd.”
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The Reliance-Jio streaming agreement will feature all matches that are covered and broadcast live by Star Sports. Those who subscribe to Jio TV will get access to not only Tests, ODIs and T20Is hosted by the BCCI but also domestic cricket games that will be broadcast live.
Akash Ambani, Reliance Jio director who announced the partnership in Mumbai, said with the signing the contract, they now aim to provide the best sporting content with the best digital infrastructure to the Jio subscribers, he said, “Jio promises to and will continue to bring a superlative customer experience in the areas of sports, AR, VR, Immersive viewing and more in the coming days.”
Mabani also said that Jio continues to bring the most exclusive content to its subscribers, this time through the JioTV app. He also focused on the fact that cricket is the most viewed game in India, something which is virtually worshipped. He said every Indian must have “access to the best sporting events as well as quality and affordable bandwidth to consume the content.”
