Posted: December 7, 2005

Athletics: Seiko Extends IAAF Sponsorship Until 2009

1985-2009: 25 Years Of Partnership

Monte Carlo – SEIKO Corporation has reached a basic sponsorship agreement with the IAAF for a further 4 years, up to 31st December 2009 at the end of which an uninterrupted 25 years of technical service and financial support will have been completed.

It was at the inaugural World Indoor Games, the precursor of the World Indoor Championships at the Bercy stadium in Paris in 1985 that SEIKO first provided timing services to an IAAF event. Since then, SEIKO has supported the IAAF with timing and measurement services and financial contributions for 21 years, during which SEIKO has timed 9 World Championships and more than 110 other IAAF events.

The new agreement covers the period 2006-2009 and includes the World Championships in 2007 in Osaka, Japan and in 2009 in Berlin, Germany, plus 21 other events, including the World Cross Country, the World Junior Championships and the prestigious end-of-season World Athletics Final.

SEIKO’s timing services to the IAAF are central to the success of each event and comprise a full suite of equipment and personnel. At the World Championships in Helsinki held in August 2005, SEIKO had a team of over 50 engineers on site for 18 days, and the equipment, all custom-built for the IAAF at a cost of over $4,500,000, required two 40ft container trucks to transport it! At each World Championships, SEIKO takes an average of 7,000 measurements of time, speed and distance during the 9-day event.

SEIKO’s 21-year partnership with the IAAF has benefited both parties. SEIKO has gained brand name exposure all over the world and its reputation as a leader in the timing industry has been enhanced through the error-free timing of the premier athletics events in the calendar. The IAAF has benefited not only from SEIKO’s reliability, but also from the leading-edge technologies that SEIKO has introduced during the period, including automated false-start systems, on-line photo-finish images and ultra-sonic wind measurement.

On signature of the basic agreement, Mr. Kunio Maeda, Senior Executive Director of Seiko Corporation, said, ‘We are delighted to renew our agreement with the IAAF. The IAAF championships are consistently among the most viewed sports events in the world, and we look forward to contributing our technology to their success in the next four years. Our goal will be to deliver, as we always have, a leading-edge and 100% reliable service to all 23 events in the programme.’

The President of the IAAF, Mr. Lamine Diack said, ‘SEIKO has been a loyal and trusted partner of the IAAF for over 20 years, and we are delighted to have the benefit of their technology and service for 4 more years. No sport needs accurate timing more than athletics where thousands of results depend on 1/1000th second accuracy and that’s why we choose SEIKO.’