Year-long efforts by Beijing Olympic organizers and the International Olympic Committee (IOC) to ensure the successful broadcasting of the 2008 Games have paid off, after Thursday's signing of a set of agreements that will lead to the establishment of the Beijing Olympic Broadcasting Co Ltd (BOB).

BOB - a joint venture (JV) between the IOC Olympic Broadcasting Services (OBS) and the Beijing Organizing Committee for the Games of the XXIX Olympiad (BOCOG) - will serve as the host broadcaster of the 2008 Olympics and 2008 Paralympics.

The company will feed national and international TV and radio networks during the Games.

The agreements, including a cooperative JV contract, articles of association, and a master operating and management agreement, were inked by Hein Verbruggen, chairman of the IOC's coordination commission for the Beijing Games and OBS, Gilbert Felli, the executive director of the Games, and Liu Jingmin and Jiang Xiaoyu, who are BOCOG executive vice-presidents.

"The agreements constitute another milestone in BOCOG's Olympic broadcasting, marking the launch of the process to establish the Beijing Olympic Broadcasting Co Ltd," Jiang remarked at the signing ceremony.

Verbruggen also expressed his satisfaction.

"Doing the production by ourselves is something that does not always easily fit in to the existing structure and organization of Chinese broadcasting," he said.

"As the president of the board of OBS, I'm happy and really looking forward to the co-operation in broadcasting in the future."

According to the agreements, BOB will be in charge of producing international TV and radio signals for the Games and important side events, constructing and operating the International Broadcasting Center and other venues, and providing other relevant broadcasting services to the rights-holding broadcasters of the Games.

As the Olympics is currently the most widely covered sporting event in the world, with the highest number of TV viewers, a successful broadcast is a prerequisite for staging a successful Olympics.

BOB was founded to ensure the quality of broadcasting, reduce operational costs and leave a technological legacy for China's broadcasting industry.

It is estimated that during the Beijing Olympics and Paralympics, more than 4 billion people will watch and listen to events.

(China Daily May 28, 2004)