Shilpa Shetty co-owned Rajasthan Royals, Shah Rukh Khan-Juhi Chawla's Kolkata Knight Riders and part owner Preity Zinta's King's XI Punjab, have all had 'royal' exits.

The teams co-owned by the three film stars had garnered a lot of interest with the stars having a large fan base even in South Africa.

Take sponsorship (the main source of revenue for IPL teams), where the Bollywood factor mattered to some while it was not critical for others. “When we decided to sponsor Rajasthan Royals, we considered if the team was well suited for our brand... The fact that a Bollywood star is one of the team’s owners could probably help the team but, it doesn’t make much of a difference to us as sponsors,” says Salil Vaidya, associate vice-president (marketing), HDFC Standard Life, one of the sponsors of Rajasthan Royals.

Nokia, on the other hand, chose to be the main sponsors for the Kolkata Knight Riders team because of the SRK factor. "We sponsored the team because SRK co-owned it. It is pretty clear that because of him the team would be extremely visible. We wanted visibility, so it was the perfect fit," says Nokia India vice-president and MD Shivakumar.

If one were to look at the teams that grabbed the maximum eyeballs, Tam ratings reveal the highest TRPs for the battle between Sachin Tendulkar’s Mumbai Indians and SRK's KKR. SRK being the team's owner has also pushed merchandise sales, not only in India but also in international markets.

The teams owned by the Bollywood stars, the Mohali, Kolkata and Jaipur franchisees are the least expensive of the eight teams - Mohali at Rs 304 crore, Kolkata at Rs 300 crore and Jaipur at Rs 268 crore, respectively. While SRK and Zinta have been in the fray from IPL season one, Shilpa Shetty entered the picture in season two with the defending champions-Jaipur's Rajasthan Royals. Shetty and her beau and businessman Raj Kundra picked up a 11.7% stake in the RR franchisee for around Rs 80 crore, valuing it at nearly Rs 680 crore.