The highest seating capacity Mercedes-Benz->ke187 of all time has just been announced, with room for 83,000. This particular Mercedes will be Atlanta's new football stadium, home to the Falcons, as well as Atlanta's soccer (the other kind of football) team, the United. That's because Mercedes has just announced that it purchased the naming rights for the stadium, to be completed in 2017, although the specifics of the deal haven't been made public. This comes just a few months after the automaker announced that Atlanta would be the new home of Mercedes-Benz USA, and apparently the Germans->ke2091 want their presence to be know in their new home town.

The stadium will be located downtown and be known simply as Mercedes-Benz Stadium. It is being built to be multipurpose, with two teams from different sports calling it home, and other sporting events using it from time to time. For example, the NCAA Men's Final Four for 2020 is already slated to use the facility. Mercedes-Benz branding will be just about everywhere you look, from what the press release suggests, and it will be until at least 2042, the year that the naming agreement expires.

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Why it matters

It's difficult to think of any kind of direct link between Mercedes-Benz and football, but in the world of paid naming rights, this certainly isn't the strangest news you'll ever read. The stadium does sound nice as well, as befitting the Mercedes name. It will have a retractable roof and a 360 degree HD video halo board. That feature is the first of its kind, and can be seen in the photos posted here.