Hi Jagjit,

Project Sponsor is the person (outside the project team) who provides the funds for the project, while on the other hand, the Project Initiator is the person (outside the project team) that brings in the project to the project team or mobilizes the project team for the project. Both of these roles are usually carried out by a single person, especially when the projects are internal to an organization. However, consider this, your company is carrying out a project for an external client on a time-phased cost reimburseable contract. In this case your project sponsor will be your customer who is directly paying for the project costs. This is a rare situation when the customer is directly paying for the project costs. Usually even if the project is being carried out for an external client, the project funds come from within the organization and project payments that are done by the customer includes the cost plus profit. When we talk about the sponsor, we talk about the project cost not the project returns or revenue.

Another example, at my company all the new projects are negotiated and brought in by my Country Manager (initiator in this case) and his team. Once the project is brought in, all the expenses, funds and approvals are handled by my Business Manager (sponsor in this case). 

I hope this answers the question.

Regards,

Exam Support Team
The PM PrepCast - http://www.premiumcast.com/vp/50398/16780/10389/