Ahead of the ICC World Cup 2023, Disney Star which has exclusive broadcast and media rights for linear and digital platforms, has roped in a record number of 26 sponsors and 500 advertisers so far, a top company official said on Wednesday.

Several of these sponsors have opted for both TV and digital formats and some of them are sponsors only on TV or for digital, company's head for sports, Sanjog Gupta said.

Disney Star is broadcasting all 48 matches of ICC Men's Cricket World Cup live on its TV channels and live streaming through its OTT platform Disney+ Hotstar.

The company has custom-built packages for advertisers, which will serve their brand objectives. It is also giving a "big push" on the digital side this year, which allows advertisers to connect with specific audience cohorts.

Moreover, the performance of the Indian team in the Asia Cup and the festive period, a time when there is a lot of buzz around consumers and spending in general from advertisers is coinciding with the ICC World Cup, has lifted spirits, he added.

"The festive period, the World Cup in India and the anticipation and confidence around the Indian team has combined along with Disney plus Hotstar and Star Sports' strong brand association to create a proposition for advertisers, which is unmissable," Gupta told PTI.

The sponsors include Coca-Cola, PhonePay, Mahindra & Mahindra, Dream11, HUL, Havells, IndusInd Bank, Pernod India, Booking.com, Peter England, Kingfisher Packaged Drinking Water, Mondelez, Emirates, Diageo, Jindal Panther, MRF Tyres, LendingKart, BPCL, Herbalife, Haier, AMFI, Google Pay, Polycab, Amul, VIDA and Amazon.

All categories have shown deep interest in associating with the World Cup on Star, he said.

"There has been an immense demand which is also buoyed by the festive season, when typically ad spends tend to be at their highest levels," Gupta added.

Several companies such as Coca-Cola, PhonePay, HUL have presence across linear and digital platforms.

Moreover, to broaden the base and diversify the number of advertisers on board for the World Cup, Disney Star has launched a "self-serve framework" for the digital platform.

This "allows agencies and advertisers to log on and book advertisements or book inventory which they believe will be needed. So it's a platform, which is user friendly and provides an end-to-end solution to an advertiser or an agency's needs, without any intervention of the Disney+ Hotstar sales teams," Gupta added.

This has been made available to digital because the scale of advertisers just in terms of the numbers and in terms of the variation in their budgets tends to be much higher on digital than it is on TV.

"The threshold for advertising on TV, which is basically the minimum level that you need to spend to be an advertiser on TV, tends to be higher. Although this year we have also customised that approach to offer solutions which advertisers on TV could also exercise despite having lower budgets," he said.

For example, if a brand given the festive period wants to come on board for just two weeks leading up to Diwali because that's where they believe they want to attract potential customers, then there will be packages that will be custom built for them which allows them to pay a little bit of a premium, but advertise in the period that is most important to them, he added.

The World Cup is returning to India after 12 years and there is "immense buzz, hype and anticipation".

"Our own plans and our ambition is around making this the biggest World Cup both in terms of all the content and programming that we are doing around the World Cup, as well as the experience that we are looking to offer. We have a long lead-up to this World Cup.

Star will broadcast and livestream through Disney+ Hotstar in nine languages and has lined up a pool of 100 commentators working across various feeds on the World Cup.

"We are producing the live experience of the World Cup in nine languages. These happen to be -- Hindi, English, Tamil, Telugu, Kannada, Malayalam, Bangla, Marathi and Gujarati," he said.

On the linear screen, a viewer will have the option of using a button on his remote to switch between languages.

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