Giant soccer ball signed by well-known athletes and World Cup personalities is auctioned for $2,840 in the Internet -- proceeds to go toward "6 Villages for 2006"
Dubai, UAE - Avaya's charity auction has come to a successful conclusion. The highest bidder for the 4.5 ft wide leather ball, which was signed by celebrities such as Sir Bobby Charlton (the former UK soccer star who led England to a World Cup victory); Rudi V?ller, Germany's leading World Cup player in the 1980s; Brazilian Formula 1 racecar star Rubens Barrichello; and many others, was Pearl, a mail-order company based in Buggingen, South Germany that sells computer accessories and software. The final bid for the trophy, which is shaped like globe, was 2,232 euros (roughly $2,840). The proceeds of the auction are to go toward SOS Children's Villages' official "6 Villages for 2006" charity campaign staged during the 2006 FIFA World Cup soccer tournament.
"We're delighted that our participation in this event will have an ongoing effect in the lives of underprivileged children," commented Nidal Abou-Ltaif, managing director, Avaya Middle East and North Africa. "This is a real example of what we mean when we say - Football unites the world, and Avaya connects it."
New SOS Children's Villages in Brazil, Mexico, Nigeria, South Africa, Vietnam and Ukraine
The proceeds of the auction will go to the official charity project of the 2006 FIFA World CupTM, "6 Villages for 2006." SOS Children's Villages is collecting donations from all over the world in this campaign in order to be able to construct and operate six new SOS Children's Villages located in Brazil, Mexico, Nigeria, South Africa, Vietnam, and Ukraine. The Villages will provide about 800 needy children with a new home. Three SOS Kindergartens, an SOS Hermann Gmeiner School, and four SOS Social Centers, all designed to support struggling families, will also be built. These facilities will also be available to children and families from the communities around the SOS Children's Villages. Overall, the "6 Villages for 2006" project will come to benefit 1,000 families and 5,000 children and young people. For more information, go to: http://www.6villagesfor2006.org.
Network Achieves Championship Performance with 99.999% Availability
According to Avaya, a total of 21,126 terabytes of voice and data traffic was transferred over the network between May 15, when the network became operational, and July 10. During that time, people have logged on to the converged communications network approximately 642,538 times and made 364,395 phone calls on the network, which represents 789,810 minutes of calling time.
On the day of the Final Match between France and Italy, 111,150 megabytes of data traffic traveled over the network, 55,037 people logged on to the converged network, and 3,456 phone calls were made, representing 6,217 minutes of calling time.-Ends-
SOS Children's Villages worldwide
Hermann Gmeiner founded the first ever SOS Children's Village in Imst in Tyrol, Austria in 1949. He believed that every abandoned child in need should once again have a mother, a family, a house and a village where they can grow up in safety like other children. These four principles led to the establishment of an international organization, which relies primarily on private donations. Currently, children in 132 countries have found a new, safe home in 470 SOS Children's Villages. In addition to the SOS Children's Villages, there are also over 1,300 other SOS facilities such as kindergartens, schools, youth facilities, training and social centers, medical centers and emergency projects, which are also available to the communities around the SOS Children's Villages.
"6 Villages for 2006" is the official charity campaign of the 2006 FIFA World Cup for the construction of six new SOS Children's Villages. These villages will provide a total of 800 children with a new home and therefore with the chance of a better future.
About Avaya
Avaya, Inc. designs, builds and manages communications networks for more than a million businesses worldwide, including over 90 percent of the FORTUNE 500. Focused on businesses large to small, Avaya is a world leader in secure and reliable Internet Protocol telephony systems and communications software applications and services.
Driving the convergence of voice and data communications with business applications, and distinguished by comprehensive worldwide services, Avaya helps customers leverage existing and new networks to achieve superior business results. For more information visit the Avaya Web site: http://www.avaya.com
About the FIFA World Cup 2006
As the Official Convergence Communication provider for the FIFA World Cup 2006, Avaya is providing a champion communications network for the World's largest sporting event. The converged network -- that combines voice and data on the same infrastructure -- will connect the 12 host stadiums, the international media centers in Munich, Berlin and Dortmund, and the FIFA headquarters in Berlin. Players, coaches, volunteers and fans alike will benefit from the Avaya network, which will be instrumental in player and journalist accreditation, the reporting of results, material tracking, accommodation confirmations, transportation, and ticketing, among other critical functions. With an estimated 45,000 network connections, 30,000 network devices and over 15 terabytes (or 15,000,000,000,000 bytes) of data, it is the largest converged communication network ever built for a sporting event.
Press contact:
Text 100 Public Relations
Iris Roidl
phone: +49 (0)89 99 83 70 19
e-mail: iris.roidl@text100.de
Press contact:
SOS Children's Villages worldwide
Wolfgang Kehl,
Project Manager "6 Villages for 2006"
phone: +49 (0)89 179 14 - 266
e-mail: wolfgang.kehl@sos-kd.org
© Press Release 2006
