If you’re an Aussie, a Brit or an American, you can’t fail to have been just a little heartbroken over the teams’ performances in this summer’s World Cup. Now that the dust has settled and the teams have all gone home, International Developer wipes down its shin pads and takes a look at the 2006 FIFA World Cup IT Solution – the nerve centre of the tournament.
Every four years, the eyes of the world turn to the largest sporting event on the planet – the FIFA World Cup. This summer, the spotlight was on Germany, with more than 30 billion television viewers following the four-week competition featuring 32 teams and 64 matches. Some three million spectators and 15,000 accredited media representatives flocked to the 12 venues spread around the host country. The result of this was that FIFA became the a massively heavy network user, placing non-stop demands on critical systems to carry out taks from accreditation and security, to logistics and game results.
FIFA and the tournament’s German organisation committee needed fast and reliable systems as well as efficient applications and infrastructure, both beforehand for planning and for the smooth running of an event as large-scale as this. Everything therefore had to function perfectly, so this is where their information technology solution played such a crucial role.