Innovation Unwrapped
Technology is both friend and foe, said Sir John Hegarty, Creative Founder, The Garage Entertainment, at Cannes Lions. And despite some reservations about AI and what it might entail, innovation was in plentiful supply.
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“This is the most interesting time in all of history. So enjoy the ride.”
This was the advice of Elon Musk, Chief Technology Officer of X. Speaking in a packed auditorium, Musk predicted that next year will be pivotal for AI – but he also warned that there’s a one-in-five chance of AI going rogue and “something going terribly wrong”. AI is already playing a bigger role in creativity: it was used in 12% of all entries submitted this year. But while some of the innovation we saw at the Festival was based on AI, it was still human-inspired.
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AI comes to you
Mira Murati, Chief Technology Officer, OpenAI, spoke about how AI is becoming more accessible: intuitively designed tools don’t require specialised skills. She said: “the technology comes to you."
We saw this across a range of health and wellbeing innovations. ‘Samsung Impulse’ is an app on the Galaxy Watch that uses haptic therapy to assist people with speech disorders. AT&T’s ‘5G Helmet’ helps D/deaf athletes play American football. EarSwitch’s ‘Airquity’ lowers respiratory death rates among Black people by measuring blood oxygen from inside the ear.
‘Magnetic Stories’ took the Grand Prix in the Pharma Lions. By Area 23 in New York, it generated a children’s story that incorporated the sounds from an MRI scan. The story turned the sounds into robots or spaceships, making MRI scans less scary for children. Siemens Healthineers, the company behind it, is now developing an integrated AI that writes stories in real time based on any scan. The Innovation Lions Grand Prix went to KVI Brave Fund Inc’s ‘Voice 2 Diabetes’. This uses AI to analyse people’s voices to see if they have type 2 diabetes. It’s already been effective in India and has the potential to scale to other markets, with estimated savings of $32bn on costlier diagnosis tools. Meanwhile, Outdoor Lions Grand Prix winner ‘Adoptable. By Pedigree’ shows AI’s efficiency at scale. This AI-powered model lets shelter dogs star in Pedigree’s digital out-of-home ads. As soon as a dog is rehomed, another replaces it on the out-of-home site. Pedigree plans to roll it out across all its digital touchpoints by 2026.
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Avoid enhanced mediocrity
There’s concern, however, that the democratisation of tech tools like ChatGPT and Midjourney will lead to what Jeriad Zoghby, Chief Commerce Strategy Officer at Interpublic Group, called “enhanced mediocrity”. He added: “Without differentiation, the competitive middle is starting to swell.” And many speakers flagged concerns about AI’s rise. One of them was Maria Ressa, the 2024 recipient of the Cannes LionHeart and Co-Founder and CEO of Rappler, a news site leading the fight for press freedom in the Philippines. Ressa made a powerful plea at the final Awards ceremony. The Nobel Peace Prize Laureate called on creative expertise in the room to consider how they can brand ‘truth’ and ‘facts’ to make them less “boring” in the AI era. Rebecca Rowntree, Creative Director at Leo Burnett and Founder of Get Sh*t Done, also offered advice.
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Pressing ‘refresh’
There were standout examples of brands innovating with familiar tools and channels. Spotify won the Digital Craft Lions Grand Prix with ‘Spreadbeats’, the first music video to be coded and experienced within an Excel spreadsheet. This encouraged media planners to consider Spotify as a video platform. And deepfakes, commonly associated with misinformation, were used to storytell and shift perception. Orange’s ‘WoMen’s Football’ duped French audiences into addressing their gender bias and took two Grands Prix: one in the Entertainment Lions for Sport and one in the Film Lions. Meanwhile, Gold PR Lion winner ‘VW 70 Years Campaign’ showed the softer side of deepfake tech by reuniting Brazilian icon Elis Regina with her daughter Maria Rita.
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Analogue innovation
The Festival also served as a powerful reminder that not all innovation is rooted in tech. Health & Wellness Lions Gold winner Buckaroo Footware developed 'Fit My Feet' kits customising flip-flops for people with clubfoot. It distributes the kit through India's network of Indian street-cobblers and plans to scale across the country. Gold Innovation Lion winner AXA provided safe refuge for victims of domestic abuse with just ‘Three Words’ added to its home insurance policies. And Gold Sustainable Development Goals Lion winner ‘Filter Caps’ offered water purification through a bottle cap. What’s more, Design Lions Grand Prix, ‘Sightwalks’ by Peruvian cement brand Sol Cement, showed how innovation can come from surprising places. The idea helped visually impaired people navigate the streets with tactile paving, using a set of numbered lines to find local businesses and services. Design Lions Jury President Fura Johannesdottir, Former Chief Creative Officer at Huge, said: “If you look harder to understand the lives of others, you can come up with amazing solutions.”
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