The International Olympic Committee (French: Comité International Olympique) is an organization based in Lausanne, Switzerland, created by Pierre de Coubertin and Demetrios Vikelas on June 23 1894. Its membership is 205 National Olympic Committees.
The IOC organizes the modern Olympic Games held in Summer and Winter, every four years. The first Summer Olympics organized by the International Olympic Committee was held in Athens, Greece, in 1896; the first Winter Olympics in Chamonix, France, in 1924. Through 1992, both Summer and Winter Olympics were held in the same year. Beginning in 1994, however, the IOC shifted the Winter Olympics to the even years between Summer Games, to help space the planning of the two events apart from one another.
