WORLD-CLASS INFORMATION TECHNOLOGY EQUAL TO THE SCALE
AND MAGNITUDE OF THE OLYMPIC GAMES

“I am grateful to Atos Origin for its daily support and dedication to the Olympic Games, its athletes and the Olympic movement. As the world witnessed the return of the Olympic Games to the nation of their birth and city of their revival, I would like to express our appreciation for your role in making this moment possible.” Jacques Rogge, President of the International Olympic Committee (IOC).

The Olympic Games is the largest sporting event to take place worldwide and at regular intervals every two years. The ATHENS 2004 Olympic Games, supported by the outstanding IT Team of Atos Origin, successfully issued and activated some 200,000 accreditations for Games that comprised 301 events representing over 4,500 hours of live competition. Live commentator services were delivered for 19 sports. Approximately 16 million INFO2004 pages were viewed, with a peak of 915,000 pages viewed on day 7. Over 3GB of live results were provided in 800,000 messages to the ATHENS 2004 website, broadcasters and sports federations. The colossal event spanned 61 competition and non-competition venues, involved 10,500 athletes, 21,500 members of the media and 45,000 volunteers.
 

BUSINESS CHALLENGES

The International Olympic Committee (IOC) chose Atos Origin as its Worldwide IT Partner and Sponsor for the Olympic Games of Athens in 2004, Turin in 2006 and Beijing in 2008. This set a new world record as the largest sports IT contract ever awarded. Atos Origin was asked to lead the consortium of 15 technology partners developing and managing the systems and software that power Information Technology solutions for ATHENS 2004.

SOLUTIONS

As lead integrator, project manager and IT operations manager, Atos Origin has also developed many of the key software applications used. Successfully delivering one of the largest IT projects in sports history represented a staggering task. The sheer volume of information processed to run and document the event creates a massive and complex IT environment requiring a dedicated power infrastructure, 900 extremely sophisticated data network servers, 10,500 computers, 4,000 results systems terminals and 4,000 printers.

One characteristic of this environment is the high degree of redundancy in data processing, which necessarily calls for fail-safe accuracy in data transfer. Another is the innovative IT security built into the entire IT environment, which could effectively be considered the highest-profile data system in the world over the course of 16 days.

Protecting the Games’ IT infrastructure from undesired and/or uncontrolled phenomena that can impact any parts of the result chain and associated services is paramount.

The innovative approach featured monitoring of all deviations from “normal” behavior of critical parameters in critical areas (applications, systems and networks), plus screening and correlation of all “alerts” to allow the security team to focus and act only upon critical issues. 430 high level security incidents were handled during the Games, with four intrusion attempts experienced per second. Finally, there was the unparalleled testing program launched to ensure that smooth, seamless operations would be ready on time.

For an event of this magnitude, deadlines are not negotiable. When world-class athletes are ready to compete for gold after years of rigorous training and qualification, there are no second chances.

BENEFITS

As one of the most high-profile customers that Atos Origin has ever had, the International Olympic Committee (IOC) has spurred Atos Origin to take on new directions since its involvement with the Olympic movement in 2004. This project was accomplished with significant cost and operational savings over previous Games. Atos Origin provided this without in any way increasing the risk of its technology operations, and actually succeeded in reducing the risk.

Today’s systems implementations objective is focused on minimized cost with minimized risk. This is demonstrated in the Olympic Games program through massive re-use, facilitated by systematic knowledge capture and thorough, disciplined systems integration practices to redeploy large applications into new environments every other year.

Specific components of the IT program critical to the Olympic Games’ success include the integrated, holistic approach to security used to manage the highly visible publicly targeted environment. Other factors include effective partner and program management for the highly complex program using a diverse consortium of technology partners; intensive operations management; and design and building phases leveraging the knowledge base created through work at previous Games, which significantly reduce the learning curve.

Meeting the immovable deadline with guaranteed quality every time can only be achieved through relentless testing. Exhaustive preparation and testing were clearly vital to the success of the IT systems, to deliver seamless services and sub-second communication to the Olympic Family (partners, sponsors, IOC members, athletes and media). Simulation testing was also used to develop test cells representing each of 37 sports and nine major applications.

For each country where the Olympic Games are held, an Organizing Committee responsible for hosting and managing that particular edition of the Games is set up. Atos Origin partners with each Organizing Committee while working with the IOC to meet its strategic objectives. It is this kind of commitment and attention to detail at the local level that won Atos Origin this most prestigious of contracts.

Key components of Atos Origin’s IT mission

• Infrastructure deployment
• Critical monitoring system
• Technology Partner management
• Knowledge capture and transfer

Key capabilities demonstrated by Atos Origin for this Olympic project

• Systems integration
• Information security
• Critical monitoring system
• Technology Partner management
• Knowledge capture and transfer

Achievements successfully completed

• Competition results delivered to all participants, athletes, officials, media and press
• Knowledge leveraged for the design of all key IT systems (3 to 5 years before start of Games)
• Key core planning applications provided and deployed (3 years before start of Games)
• Results systems integrated and tested (2 years before start of Games)
• Complete array of IT systems operating and monitored once the Games began