Visa International’s Olympic marketing campaign in Singapore kicked off with the national launch of Visa’s new Olympic-themed TV commercial featuring international movie star Jackie Chan.  The commercial is the first part of a 12-month campaign aimed at promoting Visa’s status as worldwide sponsor and partner of the world’s number one sporting event, the Olympic Games.

In addition to the commercial, Visa will run a series of country-wide Olympic-themed promotions and will also work closely with Visa member banks to help organizations in Singapore benefit from Visa’s status as the exclusive payment card and official payment service of the 2008 Beijing Olympic Games.

Visa International’s country manager for Singapore Meranda Chan said, “Visa has been closely associated with the Olympics since 1986 and the Games itself is becoming an increasingly popular event with Singaporeans as we see more Singapore athletes establish themselves in the global sporting arena. We hope our close association with the Games and local promotional activities will excite the country as we get closer to the main event and strengthen Visa’s brand preference in Singapore.”

Visa will screen the Olympic-themed regional TV commercial in Singapore on Channel 5, 8 and Channel NewsAsia, as well as at Golden Village and Shaw Brothers cinemas.  In it, Jackie Chan is depicted as the comic hero in his eagerness to participate in the Beijing 2008 Olympic Games.  The fast-paced action moves among several Olympic sports as Jackie tries to find ways and means to make it to the Games.  Eventually, he discovers an easier way to get to the Olympics - all it takes is his Visa card. 

In addition to Singapore, the commercial, which was created by Visa and its advertising agency BBDO Australia, is being aired in Australia, Thailand, Taiwan and China, and there are plans to run it in other markets across the region.

“Visa’s other Olympic-themed activities include card usage promotions to win package tours to Beijing, which we plan to launch later this year through to next year”, said Ms Chan and added that Visa’s member financial institutions are encouraged to use this partnership for the benefit of their cardholders.

As of 31 March 2007, Visa had 3.4 million cards in circulation in Singapore, of which 2.7 million are credit cards and 700,000 are debit cards. Spending on Visa credit and debit cards at merchant locations in Singapore reached US$6.8 billion, up 9.8 percent against the previous year.  Visa is accepted at more than 39,900 locations in Singapore, including merchant outlets, post offices and ATMs. .
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