ZURICH, May 24, 2010 /PRNewswire/ -- FIFA.com, the world's official football website, today announced the tech spec for its server farm in SLOUGH to house its 75 super computers to support a massive 70,000,000 page views per hour during the World Cup.

FIFA.com is expected to serve over 5.5 billion page views to fans over the 2010 World Cup, compared to the 4.2 billion recorded in 2006.

Over the past four years the world has acquired an appetite for online video, which FIFA.com will satisfy with the help of two petabytes (2,000 gigabytes) of video streaming bandwidth. To put the statistic into context, the CGI extravaganza Avatar required just one petabyte of local storage to render its spectacular 3D effects.

Matt Stone, Head of New Media at FIFA, commented:

The 2010 FIFA World Cup South Africa brings people from all over the world together with one common passion: to celebrate the beautiful game, non-stop, for a whole month. This is the first social media World Cup, where ordinary fans can become instant pundits from their living rooms. As the most popular sports event site in the world, FIFA.com will provide the authoritative content to bring the online football community together.

Matt Stone continued:

Slough was the natural choice for FIFA.com to house its additional bandwidth requirements. The state-of-the-art venue offers security and will ensure rapid delivery of the online experience to fans.

From Slough, FIFA.com is distributed globally to tens of thousands of servers which then send content to users from the closest location, meaning the fastest possible download speeds.

Particularly avid users are the millions of worldwide members of the free-to-join FIFA.com club, the world's largest online community of football fans. British fans now make up 6% of all Club members, the largest contingent in Europe.

About FIFA.com

FIFA.com, the world's official football website, is the online heart of football.

Recognised as the world's most authoritative football website, unrivalled for depth, insight and accuracy, FIFA.com reliably and impartially delivers the global football message across multiple digital platforms to an international community of millions of professionals and enthusiasts.

Constantly updated, FIFA.com (live since 1995) offers the latest news, video highlights, historical data, contact with the stars, behind-the-scenes access, and -- through the free FIFA.com Club -- a global meeting point for people who care about football.

In addition, FIFA.com supplies a one-stop shop for retail, event ticketing, accommodation and hospitality. Through serving the global football community it also delivers value to FIFA.com's commercial partners (Adidas, Coca-Cola, Emirates, Hyundai, SONY, VISA) and World Cup sponsors (Budweiser, Castrol, Continental, McDonalds, MTN, Satyam, Seara, Yingli Solar).

In an average month, FIFA.com attracts approximately 5 million unique users and generates over 80 million page views. The 2010 FIFA World Cup is predicted to generate over 5 billion page views.

About FIFA

FIFA (Federation Internationale de Football Association), an association governed by Swiss law, was founded in 1904 and is based in Zurich. It has 208 member associations and its goal, enshrined in its statutes, is the constant improvement of football. FIFA employs some 310 people from over 35 nations and is composed of a Congress (legislative body), Executive Committee (executive body), General Secretariat (administrative body) and committees (assisting the Executive Committee).

For more information, please contact: Matt Stone Head of New Media Email: matt.stone@fifa.org Telephone: +44(0)7521-683-831

SOURCE: FIFA.com

CONTACT: For more information, please contact: Matt Stone, Head of NewMedia, Email: matt.stone@fifa.org, Telephone: +44(0)7521-683-831