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To: EPS who wrote (23435)	8/8/1998 11:27:00 AM
From: EPS	Read Replies (3) \| Respond to of 42771

Published Saturday, August 8, 1998, in the San Jose Mercury News IBM drops out as Games sponsor NEW YORK (AP) -- A decision by International Business Machines Corp. to sever its 38-year marketing relationship as a sponsor of the Olympic Games is sparking a competition among about a dozen major computer companies to fill Big Blue's shoes. The interest by IBM rivals, including computer maker Hewlett-Packard Co. and software company Novell Inc., underscores that IBM's pullout hasn't tarnished the allure of the Olympics' all-gold image as a corporate marketing tool. But it has changed the rules of the game. Instead of signing an exclusive agreement as it did with IBM, Olympics organizers this time are seeking a group of computer, software and networking equipment makers to handle the behind-the-scenes technology that IBM has been doing by itself, from running Olympics World Wide Web sites to scoreboards. The idea is to spread out the multimillion-dollar cost of high-tech sponsorship, which was the big stumbling block in negotiations between Olympics organizers and IBM for an eight-year contract extension. IBM, which spent more than $100 million to sponsor the 1998 Winter Games in Nagano, Japan, and provided much of the behind-the-scenes technology for free, wanted local Olympic organizing committees to share the technology costs. Olympics organizers balked. Olympics organizers early on solicited competing proposals from several technology companies. With some bids sweeter than IBM's proposal, organizers held their ground in negotiations. Now, Olympics marketing executives will use that list of competing bidders as potential candidates for replacing IBM. IBM was one of 11 global sponsors of the 1998 Games. Most paid the IOC more than $40 million for their sponsorship packages, but IBM spent roughly twice that to fill the additional role of technology provider. One possible candidate to share the sponsorship that IBM handled is Novell, a maker of networking software based near Salt Lake City. Palo Alto-based Hewlett-Packard is touting its monthlong sponsorship of the World Cup soccer competition that ended in July as proof it can handle the Olympics. mercurycenter.com