Agencies and Industry Join Forces to Tackle Air Pollution at Cannes

Some of the world’s brightest creatives will join R&D and marketing executives from leading consumer health and hygiene company, RB, at Cannes Lions to pioneer innovative products that tackle the damaging health effects of air pollution.

Representatives from global agencies including Havas Life Medicom, McCann Health, Sudler & Hennessey and Medulla Communications will team up with RB’s R&D and marketing experts across innovation, regulatory, packaging and design, product development and medical sciences to go head-to-head in a live innovation challenge. Ideas will be presented and judged at Lions Health festival by a panel featuring Roberto Funari - RB’s Executive Vice President, Category Development, and Professor Jingang Yang - Associate Professor Fuwai Hospital and Director of Department of Health Communication, National Center of Cardiovascular Disease, Beijing, China.

The focus of the RB & Lions Health Innovation Hack will be on China, which has some of the highest levels of air pollution in the world. While considerable improvements have been made in air quality in recent years and people wearing masks are a familiar sight, some of China’s cities have PM2.5 levels that on particularly bad days, are 10 times the recommended amount. This has led to an urgent need for new, innovative products that enable consumers to protect their health and enjoy city life.

Roberto Funari, RB’s Executive Vice President, Category Development comments, “Air pollution is a huge global issue and by bringing together talented individuals across our business with creative experts from around the world, I’m hoping to see some exciting innovations that could potentially save lives in the future. At RB, we are inspired by our purpose to deliver innovative solutions for healthier lives and happier homes - solutions that make a difference today and will create a better, different tomorrow. We are passionate about working with like-minded partners who share our vision, to develop consumer driven products that encourage behavioural change and empower people to protect their own health.”

The 2017 RB & Lions Health Innovation Hack builds on last year’s successful launch, which focused on India and saw teams come up with three inventive solutions: ‘AIRbrush-It’ antipollution paint, a pollutant filtering baby pacifier and the winning idea - a musical instrument to strengthen children’s lungs, harnessed by a campaign call for “The Sound of Healthy Lungs”. RB’s R&D team is researching the concept further, exploring the possibility of potentially bringing it to market in the future to improve the lung health of the next generation.

Vinayak Shinde, a member of last year’s winning team and Creative Director at advertising agency Medulla India says: “The inaugural RB & Lions Health Innovation Hack was an inspiring and rewarding experience. Working with R&D experts was eye-opening, especially as creatives often are not involved in the early stages of product innovation. To be part of an idea’s conception, collaborating with a team of like-minded people on a serious public health issue like air pollution, was the highlight of the festival”.

Louise Benson, Festival Director at Lions Health adds, “Last year’s Innovation Hack was the first ever R&D focused event at Lions Health, and the creative ideas the participants presented were outstanding. We’re thrilled the Hack is back for another year as it provides a unique opportunity for agencies to work collaboratively with R&D experts that are normally behind the scenes to create cutting-edge, future solutions to a global issue.”