Kicking off Cannes Lions 2024 dentsu President & Global CEO, Hiroshi Igarashi and Global Chief Creative Officer, Yasuharu Sasaki took to the Dubussy theatre to showcase dentsu’s innovation key principles, work and history, and announced its innovation future in the expansion of Dentsu Lab globally from Dentsu Lab Tokyo.
Hiro-san explained on why this moment was so important, “For our industry, Cannes Lions is the heart of creative discussion and learning. Furthermore, creativity itself thrives on iteration and evolution...We encourage our teams to take concepts or technologies and combine them to create something new, the never before.”
Yasu-san unpacked dentsu’s perspective on innovation stating that “Innovation is, by its very nature, forward looking. But innovation is also a mindset that you have to continuously push, knowing that some will scale, and others will evolve in ways you perhaps don’t expect.”
During a live showcase of some of the Lab’s groundbreaking work, they explained some key principles that have guided the team since it was founded in 2014 by Yasu-san to innovate the human experience:
1. Respect the past to create the future.
2. Have an outlier perspective.
3. Discover new emotions and connections.
4. Mix. Augment. Make New.
5. Use technology to augment humanity.
Some of dentsu’s most notable works including “Aeronaut”, “Project Humanity” and “The Unfiltered History Tour” demonstrated how the business focuses on delivering impact for people, businesses, and society around the world through the power of Creativity and Innovation.
The session featured a powerful live demonstration of “All Players Welcome Special Match” — an e-sports competition that doesn’t require the players to use their hands to play. Featuring three differently abled players from Tokyo and a member of the Cannes Lions audience, the Dentsu Lab Tokyo team hosted ‘Rocket League’ a live e-sports game live on stage.
The project is the latest evolution of an initiative called “Project Humanity” with NTT R&D, to connect people, nature, and technology to maximize human wellbeing.
Whilst the message of the session focused on innovation, the importance of creativity remained clear, with Yasu-san explaining:
“It is the creative idea that elevates experience into something powerful” and that “Technology is augmenting our humanity helping us to unlock imagination and shape new experiences that bridge physical and virtual worlds.”
It was also, announced during the session, that dentsu is expanding the network’s innovation proposition, Dentsu Lab, with the first global Labs opening in London, Amsterdam, Warsaw, Mumbai and Bengaluru, with further international Labs planned for 2025.
