LONDON, UK: The London Organising Committee of the Olympic Games and Paralympic Games Limited (LOCOG) has announced that Nortel is the Official Network Infrastructure Partner and the latest London 2012 Tier One sponsor.

LOCOG is now well over half the way to reaching its domestic sponsorship target.

London 2012 will make the most of exciting new technology and communications to get people closer to the action they want to see, when, where and how they want to experience it.

"London 2012 will be the Games for a connected world – connecting people in revolutionary ways and enriching the Olympic and Paralympic experience by bringing people closer to the Games than ever before.  It will be an evolution of the Games and provide an online immersive environment where athletes and spectators can share their Olympic and Paralympic memories instantaneously," said Mike Zafirovski, President and CEO of Nortel, "The network infrastructure is fundamental to the Games and critical to the delivery of its communications services. 

Fresh from the Vancouver 2010 Winter Games, our team will be experienced in providing the level of passion, support and expertise required to help deliver the Olympic and Paralympic Games in London in 2012."

As Official Network Infrastructure Partner, Nortel will be responsible for providing BT with the equipment to enable secure and robust Wide Area Networks, wireless Local Area Networks, call centre and fixed telephony infrastructure which LOCOG requires to stage the Games.  London 2012's communications will support over 205 international sporting organisations, 20,000 worldwide media, nine million spectators, and over four billion television viewers of the London Games. 

Sebastian Coe, Chair of London 2012 commented: "As we head to Beijing, I'm thrilled to have another world class partner on board. Nortel will be a great partner, and, as well as bringing 'best in class' products to the table, will be supporting our sustainability commitments and our education programme too. 

We are counting on Nortel with their Olympic Games experience and breadth of expertise for mission-critical projects to ensure successful delivery of our Games requirements. Commercially, we are in great shape, with four years to go we are in the unprecedented position of having raised over 60% of our domestic sponsorship targets already."

Nortel will provide this equipment to BT, London 2012's Communications Services Partner.  BT is the communications services partner to the London 2012 Olympic and Paralympic Games and has a longstanding relationship with Nortel.  Patrick O'Connell, President, Delivery & Service Operations, BT Global Services said:

"Nortel has supplied network equipment to BT for many years enabling us to deliver communications services to some of our major corporate and government customers in the UK. We welcome them to the London 2012 programme, supporting BT's delivery of the critical communications infrastructure for the London 2012 Olympic and Paralympic Games."  

LOCOG is proud to have these two world-class organisations working together to ensure delivery of these critical requirements for the successful staging of the Games.  Nortel will also receive exclusive marketing rights and usage rights to the London 2012 brand within its sector.

Technology and communication at Games' time will require significant and complex logistical operations.  Nortel will form part of LOCOG's One technology team, which also includes Atos Origin, BT and Samsung, and these organisations will play a fundamental role in delivering the communications for the Games. 

In addition to EDF Energy, BT and BP, Nortel becomes London 2012's fourth Sustainability Partner and will work with London 2012 and partners to reduce the environmental impacts of hosting the Games.  Nortel will add value to the 2012 Sustainability agenda by reducing the carbon footprint of the products they supply for the Games and driving energy efficiency in the workplace.

Nortel has also committed to contributing to London 2012's Education Programme by providing resources and training to students across the UK. 

Nortel is a sponsor of the Winter Games in Vancouver which takes place in 2010, and will bring valuable experience to London 2012.

London 2012 now has seven Tier One Partners and one Tier Two Supporter as it raises the £2bn of private finance needed for staging the Olympic Games and Paralympic Games in 2012 in addition to the eight worldwide TOP Sponsors.