Reportage
Inside Nike’s second innings in India
Within six days, Nike returned to Indian cricket and launched its first running shoe designed for India. Much of the comeback is being built outside Nike India, a loss-making wholesaler.
Reportage
Reportage
How to sell the ISL in 124 days
With two teams gone and no guaranteed rights fee, the clubs put every match on YouTube.
Reportage
The Rs 1,500 crore prompt: How Google and OpenAI bought into Indian cricket
As gaming money receded, Google and OpenAI turned to cricket with rights, partnerships, and media packages valued at nearly Rs 1,500 crore. Both want their products to become the first place Indians turn to when a question comes to mind.
Reportage
JSW Inspire and the business behind India’s other blue
Since 2022, JSW Inspire has dressed India at multi-sport Games, using the IOA’s apparel rights to build a sportswear business within an Olympic sponsorship market that had no organised commercial structure a decade ago.
Reportage
Why India’s world champions are headed to a ramen town
India’s one-off T20 against Japan, played on a former school field, precedes the men’s Asian Games campaign and opens the countries’ 75th-anniversary celebrations. The match carries a commercial aim as Indian cricket looks abroad for growth.
Reportage
Pro Kabaddi’s next raid is for growth
For a decade, the Pro Kabaddi League taught India to watch. The next five years will test whether that attention can become a business.
Reportage
The underwear made for India’s sporting itch
Coimbatore-based TRYB is building men’s sports innerwear without patents or a pitch deck. It is asking men to spend on a discomfort they have mostly learned to keep private.
Reportage
Factory reset: How Agilitas is building sportswear backwards
After turning Puma into India’s biggest sportswear business, Abhishek Ganguly is trying to build a sportswear company from the factory floor up, bringing manufacturing, licensed labels, owned brands, and retail into one company.
Reportage
Jamshedpur FC: The club Tata built, and walked away from
Tata Steel spent Rs 321 crore and nine years building Indian football’s most credible club. Jamshedpur FC’s nine-year run ended on an unpaid invoice of Rs 55 lakh.
Reportage
The Sweat Thesis
For a decade, Cult.fit has argued that the gym that actually makes people sweat is the one that makes money. The IPO is the first public test of that argument.
Reportage
‘Why not us?’ Inside the making and remaking of Virat Kohli’s One8
Once just another name on a Puma tag, One8 is now Virat Kohli’s equity bet with Agilitas’ Abhishek Ganguly: a homegrown sportswear label that aims to compete with the logos Indian kids grew up chasing.
Reportage
The league that lifted Indian volleyball
While the national body cycled through suspensions, a privately run league built the pipeline that powered India’s bronze at the AVC Cup.