Mountain Dew has partnered with Kings XI Punjab as its official sponsor for the upcoming season of IPL. The deal has earned exclusive rights for the IPL home matches by featuring the brand on player’s uniforms.

Alpana Titus, Executive Director (flavors) PepsiCo India told the press that the partnership will help Mountain Dew as a brand launch consumer engagements that will help strengthening the market share in North India specifically Haryana, Himachal, Punjab, Jammu and Kashmir. PepsiCo India has gained a good share in the market from Punjab and Haryana and Mountain Dew as a brand has been responsible for the growth of success.

Alpana Titus also disclosed that they are soon rolling out a campaign “’Dar ki Wicket Girayega to Hamare Saath Khelega’” for cricket fans who get to play with their favorite icons from KXIP. The winner also gets to take home branded merchandise, complementary tickets to IPL matches and other value added gifts.

The brand will adopt a 360 degree marketing approach and roll out marketing campaigns across colleges, marketplaces, radio, TV, outdoor and multiplexes, where direct engagement with consumers is possible.

There’s almost a month for IPL to get kick started, but the news just can’t stop pouring in. Be it the controversy around Pak players, live telecast on YouTube or the mere excitement of being back in India, we just can’t get enough of it. The latest is the deal cracked between IPL and Colors channel.

According to sources, a three-year licensing deal has been signed between IPL and Viacom18’s Hindi GEC, Colors. As part of the deal, special programmes will be created around IPL and the cricket wonders all year round to cater to the audience what is being termed as ‘cricketainment’.

IPL’s chairman and commissioner, Lalit Modi, said, “The partnership with Colors takes the IPL cricketainment quotient into an all-new orbit. With this unique partnership with the channel that we have entered on behalf of our franchisees, we are delivering on our promise to extend the IPL franchise beyond cricket, beyond the IPL season. This move combines our IPL cricketers’ mass appeal and Colors’ flagship format shows, to create an unprecedented genre of cricketainment.”

Rajesh Kamat, group chief operating officer, Viacom18, and chief executive officer, Colors, further added, “Both the tournament and the channel are two-year old brands and both believe in being disruptive. IPL created a stir in the game of cricket and Colors did the same in the GEC space. The coming together of the two brands is a deadly mix of religion and passion — cricket is a religion with the cricket-crazy nation and Bollywood stars are a passion with Bollywood lovers.”

The programming innovation at Colors will see national and International players starring in reality show Fear Factor Khatron Ke Khiladi, post IPL. Apart from this, an award show, titled IPL Awards Night will also feature on the channel followed by a cricket talent hunt show Rockstar.

Kamat concluded, “Fiction is bread and butter for the channel. Thus, IPL-led content will be geared to fit towards non-fiction slots. Moreover, IPL-based content will serve to add variety to the content on offer for viewers.”

The third season of Indian Premier League is surely going to be bigger than expected. The latest is the deal signed between IPL and Google India, which would allow cricket lovers to watch the game live through YouTube. This will include 44 days of IPL with 59 matches. IPL 2010 is scheduled to start in March.

Per the deal, YouTube will broadcast matches live or on a short delay on a dedicated YouTube channel. The viewership will not apply in the USA, which will have re-broadcast options.

Confirming the news, Lalit Modi, added, “This changes the world of sports broadcasting. The internet has changed the lives of everyone and this will do the same for sport. We are now taking our event truly global for the first time. Google gives us access to 500 million pairs of eyes every single moment of the day. There are a few countries where the feed will be near as live which means there will be a delay of only a few minutes, but most places will be able to see live streaming of the action.”

“We do not have a live feed in the UK. People in the UK keep asking me why they can’t see it. Now if they have a broadband connection they can get it for free. It is about broadening the fan base, after that everything follows,” Modi said.

“We are thrilled to have the IPL as our global partner,” said Shailesh Rao, senior manager of Google India. “YouTube offers an open platform for sports and entertainment companies to take their content to a global audience and a great opportunity for advertisers.”

Shailesh Rao added that the medium would just allow anyone with a broadband connection to watch the match live and at the same time give the ultimate control in the hand of the viewers. So they can freeze, fast-forward and rewind the feed, as well as watch replays at any time during the day, a choice that is unavailable to television viewers who are bound by broadcast schedules.

The Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) during its 80th annual general meeting (AGM) in Mumbai announced the decision to restore IMG as the promoting agency for the Indian Premier League (IPL) Twenty20 tournament. The agency was associated with IPL since the first season, but things changed after dispute over their fee for the second season held at South Africa.

The agency had presented a bill of Rs 33 crore to BCCI, which was not accepted by the board as it seemed objectionable to some BCCI officials. The Board’s demand to lower the fee was not accepted by IMG, which later decided to terminate the contract at a meeting of its working committee on 13 August, with BCCI secretary N. Srinivasan conveying the message in writing to the agency.

However, with seven out of eight IPL teams favoring IMG along with support from agriculture minister and former board president Sharad Pawar, league boss Lalit Modi and broadcast partner Multi Screen Media Pvt. Ltd, BCCI had to reopen talks with IMG.

While IMG will be paid Rs33 crore for its work on the second season of IPL in South Africa early this year, the new agreement states that IMG will have to settle for a fixed sum of Rs27 crore as annual fee for the next eight years of the contract, said Shashank Manohar, president, BCCI.

Royal Challengers Bangalore (RCB), the IPL team owned by business tycoon Vijay Mallya is currently looking for a chief blogger, a chief photographer and a chief RCB fan for the upcoming Airtel Twenty20 Champions League.

The current blog on the Royal Challengers website is only utilized for updating members about the game related info. The blog will be replaced as soon as a chief blogger is appointed. The job opening for the same will feature on the site so that all the interested candidates could apply for it. The officials are looking at the blog as an interactive tool between the game and its fans. Nidhi Makhija, community manager also added, “We are interested in seeing how the community shapes the website during the Champions League. Fan participation and response will definitely have a large influence on the future of the website. We aim to grow and evolve with the needs of the community,”

The team has also come up with Royal Challengers Fanatic Fans Challenge, where three RCB fans will get the privilege of travelling with the RCB Team as the official RCB staff and also get preferred access to RCB matches during the upcoming Champions League.