Xerox signs up as 3m Rugby World Cup sponsor

Xerox, the office supplier, has signed up as one of the final sponsors for the Rugby World Cup, to be held in Wales in 1999.

Xerox joins Guinness, Visa, Coca-Cola, South African Airways and Lloyds TSB as official sponsors.

Each company has paid about 3m to be involved. For that sum, they have the right to use official World Cup logos and perimeter board advertising at all 41 games.

The packages were sold by sports agency International Management Group. IMG still has two packages left, but it expects to sell them by Christmas.

As part of its sponsorship deal, Xerox will supply the 18 media centres in the games with office equipment.

Xerox UK managing director Rob Walker says: “The Rugby World Cup is a major business in its own right. We are looking forward to the challenge of providing the organisers with the support and networking services to enable their business to run efficiently over the period of the tournament.”

Xerox will begin its involvement in the competition in November this year, where it has a presence in the tournament’s European qualifying rounds.

The Rugby World Cup 1999 is expected to have a cumulative television audience of 3 billion across 135 countries. Live attendance of matches is projected to total 1.5 million.