With sales of €24 billion in 2008, Continental AG is one of the world’s leading automotive suppliers and tyre manufacturers. For its part, the Passenger and Light Truck Tyres division, with a worldwide workforce of around 27,000 and sales of €5 billion, is market leader overall in Europe, controlling more than 20% of the European original equipment and replacement tyre business.

With our involvement as official sponsor of the UEFA Champions League (1995 – 2000), UEFA EURO 2008, and the 2006 and 2010 FIFA World Cup, we very successfully focus on exclusive event sponsorship, making use of international pro soccer as a central communications platform to boost the visibility of our premium Continental brand. Another aim of sponsorship is to charge our brand image with a share of the positive emotions aroused by world’s most popular sport. With classic advertising this would not be as effectively and immediately feasible. We also exploit the popularity of these major tournaments to strengthen customer relationships all around the world.

We now make targeted use of the experience gathered in past tournaments to implement package sponsorship concepts that are continually remolded to comport better with the host country and the conditions there. We actively involve both our customers and end users in all of this, something which is possible thanks only to our status as official sponsor. As part of this we provide unique opportunities to attend the games – with and without catering – combined with enticing side attractions like product presentations. We also make a point of integrating sponsorship early on into our marketing communications. As we have consistently met our targets in the past few years, it was an easy matter for us to decide to become an official sponsor of the 2010 FIFA World Cup South Africa^TM. We are looking forward to an extra-special tournament in South Africa!

Advertising links soccer and tyres.

Presently Continental is running a short spot in which soccer sponsoring is linked to passenger tyres. It is very similar to what we did in the past, albeit this time without a prominent testimonial from a pro soccer player. For the 2006 FIFA World Cup and UEFA EURO 2008, Continental engaged the services of Timo Hildebrand, the national goal keeper at the time, as promotional partner for the Continental premium brand. The “Goalkeeper” TV spot was aired concurrently.

For years now, our ad campaigns have also been linking sponsoring and product promotion. This has included showing diverse products as stylized “tyre stadiums”, using summer tyres in the spring campaigns and winter tyres in the fall campaigns and inserting statements on our products’ ultra-high safety features. Customer safety is, after all, a matter close to our hearts. As market leader in Europe, we want our products to make an important contribution to enhancing traffic safety.

Fostering the next generation: ContiTrainingCamps since 2003, together with the German Soccer League’s record-setting player, Charly Körbel, and the Eintracht Frankfurt soccer school, as well as partners in the tyre trade.

Keenly aware of the importance of nurturing the next generation of talent in Germany, Continental has been backing efforts in this direction since 2003. Each year it sponsors eight to ten ContiTrainingCamps for youngsters. It has entered into a close collaboration with Eintracht Frankfurt's soccer school under the direction of the German Soccer League’s record-setting player, Charly Körbel. For each camp it gets one or more tyre trade business partners to become actively involved.

In the estimation of experts, the program zeros in on just the right things and is considerably more effective than other soccer schools. Training camps for girls and boys aged 7 to 13, which have gotten started in many regions of Germany, have proved quite popular. Running for several days, these training camps enable up to eighty kids to acquire, improve or deepen their soccer skills under the direction of experienced and competent trainer teams, made up chiefly of former German Soccer League players. Above and beyond this Continental also supports the Eintracht Frankfurt soccer school’s academy, founded in 2004. Specially gifted young people come to the academy for additional training sessions held on a regular basis.

Available on the Internet: ContiSoccerWorld.

“Continental and soccer” – this connection is also carried through into the realm of infotainment. Attractive Internet sites target soccer fans from around the world. In existence since 2005, the informative Website at www.contisoccerworld.com enables soccer fans to keep up on the world’s major tournaments and their qualification rounds, with details on the teams, stars and trainers. It also focuses in on Continental’s soccer activities and its tyres. And last but not least, another key component of our sponsoring activities is constantly updated information on Continental’s promotional activities, which may, for example, take the form of drawings for tickets or a soccer quiz offering attractive prizes.

With sales exceeding €24 billion in 2008, the Continental Corporation is one of the top automotive suppliers worldwide. As a supplier of tyres, brake systems, powertrain and chassis systems and components, instrumentation, infotainment solutions, vehicle electronics and technical elastomers, the corporation contributes towards enhanced driving safety and protection of the global climate. Continental is also a competent partner in networked automobile communication. The corporation currently employs approximately 133,000 at nearly 190 locations in 35 countries.

Continental is the market leader in Europe for passenger and light truck tyres. More than 30 percent of all new European cars leave the factory fitted with Continental tyres. The tyre divisions are an official sponsor of the 2010 FIFA World Cup South Africa™.