March 25, 2002
MFS Investment Management® Presents
Jimmy Fund Events for Fourth Straight Year
BOSTON — For employees of MFS Investment Management®, supporting the Jimmy Fund is a physical and emotional effort that, after three years, has become part of the company's culture. With overwhelmingly successful fundraising efforts that last year garnered about $850,000 for cancer care and research at Dana-Farber Cancer Institute, MFS has announced its fourth consecutive year as a Jimmy Fund corporate sponsor.
The corporate sponsorship is a company-wide effort in which about 250 MFS employees volunteer for and participate in the athletic fundraising events. This year marks MFS's fourth year presenting the PMC and its second year presenting the Boston Marathon® Jimmy Fund Walk. Since 1998, MFS has contributed over $2.25 million to the Jimmy Fund through its presenting sponsorship of the Pan-Massachusetts Challenge (PMC) and the Boston Marathon® Jimmy Fund Walk.
More than 80 MFS employees and family members will ride one of the PMC's six routes across Massachusetts on Aug. 3 and 4 while another 50 will volunteer along the route. On September 29, more than 100 MFS employees will walk or volunteer in the 14th annual Boston Marathon® Jimmy Fund Walk.
"Our support of these Jimmy Fund events is a cooperative effort within the company and across the Commonwealth," says Karen Brooks of the MFS Charitable Foundation. "Our employees are inspired by the extraordinary care and research they support at Dana-Farber Cancer Institute. They feel good about joining together as co-workers and extending our MFS family into the community."
From June 17 through June 21, MFS will host its annual corporate-wide fundraising week at the firm's offices in Boston and Phoenix. Each day will present a different opportunity for MFS employees to contribute to their co-workers' fund-raising efforts on behalf of the Jimmy Fund.
The Jimmy Fund's largest fundraising events, the PMC and Boston Marathon® Jimmy Fund Walk, expect to raise nearly $20 million, well over half of all event-funds generated in 2002. Founded in 1980, the PMC is the nation's first charity bike-a-thon; as it embarks upon its 23rd year, thousands of PMC riders are striving to reach a $15 million fund-raising goal for the two-day August event. To date, PMC riders have contributed nearly $69 million to the Jimmy Fund. The Boston Marathon® Jimmy Fund Walk attracts more than 8,000 participants each year, some walking the entire 26.2-mile Boston Marathon® route from Hopkinton to Boston. Since 1989, the Boston Marathon Jimmy® Fund Walk has raised approximately $22.5 million.
In 2002, MFS was named one of Fortune magazine's top 100 Best Places to Work across the nation. Cited for its company-wide commitment to its employees and for maintaining a corporate environment based on mutual respect, teamwork, and concern for each other as co-workers and peers, MFS has been honored three times since the Fortune 100 List was created five years ago. It is programs like the Jimmy Fund sponsorship that enhance MFS' corporate culture, according to Brooks. "MFS employees and the company as a whole benefit from working together outside of the office, representing our company, and being a part of the greater community," Brooks says. "These community service efforts are very much a part of who we are at MFS."
About MFS Investment Management
MFS Investment Management, which invented the mutual fund in 1924, is a global asset management firm, managing more than $137 billion in assets on behalf of 6.5 million individual and institutional investors worldwide as of December 31, 2001.
About the Jimmy Fund
The Jimmy Fund supports the fight against cancer at Boston's Dana-Farber Cancer Institute, which is recognized by the National Cancer Institute as one of the leaders in cancer care and research. Since 1948, millions have contributed to the Jimmy Fund and helped raise the chance of survival for children and adults with cancer around the world. Its supporters, including walkers and PMC riders, have been instrumental in helping Dana-Farber's clinicians and researchers learn more about cancer and its causes, and to develop new, increasingly effective treatments to be used worldwide. For information about the Boston Marathon® Jimmy Fund Walk, visit www.jimmyfund.org or call 1-(800) 632-3562. For more information about the Pan-Massachusetts Challenge, visit www.pmc.org or call 1-(800) WE-CYCLE.
