DEL MAR: NRI cricket fans in America have something to look forward to. Cavalcade of Sports Media has announced that its affiliate, The Bollywood Channel, has entered into a Letter of Intent to acquire Cricmania.com. The Virginia based web site (www.cricmania.com) provides cricket scores, updates and cricket-related statistics.
As a part of the transaction, Cricmania.coms founder, Atul Mehta, will join The Bollywood Channel to develop and manage the channels cricket programming content.
Also, in a related development, The Bollywood Channel announced that it has retained Dr. George Conyne who is a history professor and acting director of American Studies at Kent University, Canterbury, UK. He will prepare the treatment for a 13 week series The History of Cricket. Dr. Conyne, a cricket fan and an ex-Manager of the Haverford College cricket team (1975-1979), serves as a cricket umpire.
President of Cavalcade Edward Litwak stated: "The Bollywood Channel will be a full service channel, offering a variety of ethnic programming to the Indian community, including sports, with an emphasis on cricket. The acquisition of Cricmania.com will give the channel a premier data base and excellent real time cricket connections, to provide viewers with constantly up-dated scores and game developments, while being supported by a comprehensive database, " He also added, " In addition, the initial programming, to be centered on the series The History of Cricket, is intended to establish The Bollywood Channel as the channel of choice for not only Indian viewers, but all the cricket fans. At the same time, Cavalcades Sports Broadcasting Network division will have access to the cricket scores and game details for delivery to the regular sports community."
Mehta said, "The database assembled by Cricmania.com and the continuous cricket coverage offered by the web site will complement the Bollywood Channels programming and support its efforts to be the primary channel for cricket fans. At the same time, we are currently at an approximate break-even position and this will give us the support needed to realise our potential and profitability."
