CVC seeks BCCI permission to sell majority stake to Torrent in GT

Gujarat Titans won the title in the 2022 edition of the IPL © BCCI/IPL
The management of Gujarat Titans is set to change hands as Torrent, a Ahmedabad-based Pharmaceuticals company, is buying a majority stake in the Indian Premier League (IPL) franchise. A formal request has gone to the Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) from CVC Capital, a private equity firm that controls the Titans team presently, for permission.

The Torrent takeover of Gujarat Titans has been in the pipeline for close to two years but it has not taken place on paper because of the mandatory three-year lock-in clause that an IPL franchise is bound by. The BCCI rules stipulate that the management cannot change in the first three years of its contract with a franchise. CVC bought the franchise in February 2022 and it can be confirmed that the lock-in period ended on Monday (February 10).

The development has been confirmed to Cricbuzz by representatives of the two companies. Torrent will buy a controlling stake in the Titans and the valuation is believed to have gone up by more than 50 per cent. The exact price of the deal and stake being transferred is not being disclosed but it is understood that Torrent will buy more than 60 per cent in the team.

Torrent unsuccessfully participated in the bidding process for a new IPL team in 2022 when the BCCI had auctioned two teams - Ahmedabad and Lucknow. Torrent, then, had placed a bid of Rs 4653 crore. Eventually the CVC Group won the team with a bid of Rs 5625 crore. The Adani Group, which was the favourite to bag the franchise then, had a bid of Rs 5100 crore.

With the Titans doing well from the beginning, winning the title in the very first year of its inception (in 2022) and reaching the final in 2023, the franchise has done well businesswise. It is believed that it is valued at Rs Rs 7800 crores. The Lucknow franchise, which was bought at the same time by Sanjiv Goenka, was sold for Rs 7090 crore, setting the benchmark for the valuation of an IPL team.

The change of ownership is not expected to drastically alter the management at this stage. The team will continue to be led by Shubman Gill and the coaching staff of the Ashish Nehra-Vikram Solanki combine will remain for, at least, the upcoming season. Any further change can only be expected after the IPL season.