Cricket might not be as popular a sport within the United States because it is elsewhere on this planet, but some high-profile CEOs and investors try to vary that.
As the Men's T20 Cricket World Cupwhich the United States is co-hosting for the primary time, is gaining momentum, with investors pumping nearly a billion dollars into its American ambitions.
Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella and Adobe CEO Shantanu Narayen is among the many executives investing in the brand new US skilled league Major League Cricket. Other cricket investors include Iconic Ventures, Madrona Venture Group and executives from Google.
“I’m excited to see if cricket can become a mainstream sport in the U.S.,” says Soma Somasegar, enterprise capitalist and CEO of Madrona.
Somasegar and Nadella are among the many principal owners of Seattle's cricket team, the Orcas. They are also investors in your entire league.
“Satya [Nadella] and I've been talking about bringing cricket to America for many years,” Somasegar told CNBC.
Nadella is such a die-hard cricket fan that Microsoft has a cricket field on its campus in Bellevue, Washington.
“Many of us immigrants grew up with this sport. We studied and watched cricket – over and over again,” said Somasegar.
In total, nearly $850 million is currently being invested to construct a viable cricket league within the United States, people aware of the funding said. The people asked to not be identified since the funding information is confidential.
There are currently six skilled teams in Major League Cricket, Each team is anticipated to spend between $75 million and $100 million over the approaching years, including the associated fee of assembling a team, recruiting the appropriate talent and constructing stadiums to host live cricket matches.
The T20 World Cup, which can be held throughout June at three locations within the USA and a number of other within the West Indies, can even add to the joy.
On Thursday, the US team defeated Pakistan in a surprise blow in a match near Dallas. Fans are actually counting down the times until the highly anticipated India-Pakistan match on Sunday on the newly built Nassau County Stadium in New York.
The last time India and Pakistan met, greater than 300 million people in India tuned in to observe the sport, based on the New York Times.
Ticket reseller StubHub said the common ticket price for Sunday's rivalry game is $1,300. The average price for the tournament's other 54 games is $120, the corporate said.
Venture capitalist Anurag Jain, co-owner of the key league cricket team San Francisco Unicorns, said the U.S. national team consists mostly of players from the league.
“The aim is to make cricket a mainstream sport,” said Satyan Gajwani, vice chairman of Times Internet, the digital arm of the Times of India. He runs Willow TV, which has exclusive streaming rights for cricket in North America, including the T20 World Cup.
Gajwani can also be one in every of the investors within the US league. He said his group desires to appeal to the incredibly loyal fans from South Asia who live within the US.
“Basically, you have five million really diehard fans who love cricket,” Gajwani told CNBC, referring to the South Asian diaspora within the United States.
He added that expats from the UK and Australia living within the US are also big cricket consumers.
South Asians have, on average, the best gross income of any ethnic group within the United States, based on a study by Indiaspora, a nonprofit community of Indian leaders from around the globe.
“This leaves a lot of disposable income that can be spent on sports and entertainment,” said MR Rangaswami, founder and chairman of Indiaspora.
Rangaswami, who said he could be at Sunday's game, acknowledged that the U.S. sports scene is difficult to interrupt into because Americans are fascinated by basketball and soccer. He said one possible entry point could possibly be baseball fans, which has some similarity to cricket.
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