From sports to content IPs, tech brands bet on sponsorships for mass reach in India

New Delhi: Tech companies that scaled online are now stepping into big-ticket sponsorships in India, using sports and TV intellectual properties to widen reach and shape mainstream perception.

One of the clearest signals is the Women’s Premier League. OpenAI’s ChatGPT has been signed as a Premier Partner for the next two WPL seasons, a sponsorship roster that typically features banks, consumer brands and large advertisers.

The move underlines how AI-first brands are chasing India’s highest-reach cultural moments, not just digital performance metrics. For OpenAI, the India play has also included developer outreach through hackathons and learning-led initiatives linked to its training and ecosystem push.

Canva, too, has shown an appetite for mass visibility in India. At the same time, Canva has joined Shark Tank India Season 5 as the title sponsor, giving the design platform a prime-time, mass-market footprint beyond its creator-led base.

As per reports, it was also among the bidders for Team India cricket jersey sponsorship rights, with reports pegging its bid at around Rs 544 crore, though Apollo Tyres won the deal at about Rs 579 crore. 

In the broadcast-led sponsorship ecosystem, Google has also been an active brand partner. For the ICC Women’s World Cup 2025, JioStar’s sponsor line-up included multiple Google brands such as Gemini, Pay, Android and Pixel, alongside other large advertisers. Separately, ICC announced Google as a global partner for ICC women’s cricket events in 2025.

The India trend mirrors global plays where tech companies have used marquee events to buy premium cultural attention. Apple Music took over as sponsor of the Super Bowl halftime show, while TikTok became an official partner for UEFA EURO 2020, using the tournament to expand beyond its core youth perception.

For marketers, the message is straightforward. As tech products move from early adopters to mass users, brands are increasingly treating sponsorship-led visibility as a faster route to trust, recall and community pull, especially in markets like India, where cricket and prime-time IPs still deliver unmatched scale.