Supporting sports
VODAFONE Egypt has unveiled an ambitious programme designed to help improve the standard of sports in the country.
At a recent press conference, Vodafone, one of Egypt's leading private mobile phone companies, said it plans to support several sports federations in Egypt. Football tops Vodafone's list as it aids the national team and helps organise the tournaments it plays in. The company sponsors young athletes and the scouting for new talent.
In all, Vodafone works with 11 sports federations, including squash, tennis, table tennis, shooting, swimming and other water sports and fencing.
The company is close to signing an agreement with the Egyptian Swimming Federation to sponsor the First World Long-Distance Swimming Championship to be held in Sharm El-Sheikh in September.
Discussed at the conference was the role of telecommunications technology in sports events, specifically the services Vodafone has set up for the 2002 World Cup. Its public services include the World Cup SMS which allows the public to access match results and headline news. The voice information service is for inquiries on team progress, the latest news from the championship, including that of players and teams, and the history of the World Cup.
According to Vodafone, such services are particularly important to football fans, especially since most of the World Cup matches, being played in Korea and Japan, are played in the morning, Cairo time, making them difficult to follow.
Vodafone's sponsorship programmes include the 2001 World Fencing Championship, in which Egypt took a bronze medal for the first time in its history.
Vodafone Egypt also sponsored the World Shooting Championship, which was held in Egypt for the first time, in addition to the Egyptian women's squash team that came in third in the world.
Vodafone Egypt sponsored the Egyptian International Marathon for four consecutive years and has strong ties with the Egyptian Handicapped Federation.
At the conference was Hatem Dewidar, marketing director of Vodafone Egypt, and European-based Egyptian football player Ahmed "Mido" Hossam, who plays for Dutch team Ajax Amsterdam.
Hossam, above, related his experience as a professional football player abroad and urged the Egyptian Football Association to encourage its players to take up the sport professionally "to gain experience and to simply get better".
The 19-year-old underlined the importance of athletic sponsorship in raising the level of sports "especially since the most famous clubs in the world operate under the sponsorship of associations and companies".
A presentation of Vodafone Egypt's programme for sports sponsorship was given by Khaled Badr, Vodafone's public relations and sports sponsorship manager.
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