AKQA Announces 2009 Future Lions Winners

CANNES, France -

4th annual global student competition demonstrates digital

concepts reaching the real world

AKQA presented the winning entries in its fourth annual Future Lions Competition at the Cannes Lions Festival held today in Cannes, France. The global creative competition featured work from more than 700 teams around the world. Students from five winning teams were introduced to top shops attending the Cannes 2009 Lions Festival.

“It was an intense competition this year and support from the festival and the traction the competition has gained over the years resulted in some extraordinary entries,” said Rei Inamoto, Chief Creative Officer at AKQA. “These students are thinking on a level that will certainly influence the future of our industry.”

The Future Lions challenge is to develop an idea for advertising a brand in a way that would not have been possible five years ago. There are no rules in terms of media selection or technology; no restrictions around product or target audience; and no fee to enter. The five winning Future Lions concepts will be posted at the Future Lions web site and Facebook page the week following the festival. They are:

- “Fortum Active” by Gustav Johansson, Erik Hogfeldt and Rasmus Keger of Berghs School of Communication in Sweden - “Element” by Hallvard Fjeldbraaten and Morten Halvorsen of Westerdals School of Communication - “Expedia Warm Up” by Ebony Holmberg and Jason Deacon of Royal Melbourne Institute of Technology - “IKEA Augmented Reality” by Gian Jonathan and Wai Wa of Nanyang Academy of Fine Arts - “Starbucks Be Steady” by Sungkwon Ha and Michael Jungho Oh of the School of Visual Arts, New York

Additionally, the Berghs School of Communication in Sweden was named 2009 Future Lions School of the Year for achieving the greatest number of shortlist entries.

In addition to winning registration to the festival, sponsors provide Adobe Creative Suite 4: Web Premium and a customized Flip MinoHD(TM) camcorder to document their experience in Cannes.

Previous Future Lions winners can be found producing innovative work for notable agencies such as Crispin Porter + Bogusky, Saatchi & Saatchi, Jung von Matt and Fafar. Please visit www.futurelions.com next week to view entries of the 2009 winners.

www.futurelions.com

www.facebook.com/futurelions

About AKQA Future Lions

AKQA’s annual Future Lions student advertising competition gives students a chance to shake up the advertising world at Cannes. The competition challenges students to develop an idea for advertising a global brand in a way that would not have been possible five years ago. There are no rules in terms of media selection or technology; no restrictions around product or target audience. A Future Lion redefines the medium and the message and influences the way media is consumed in the future.

About AKQA

AKQA is one of the world’s most influential creative and technology companies. A recognized pioneer and innovator, AKQA provides ideas, insights, customer relationship marketing and e-commerce solutions to the world’s leading brands. AKQA has offices in Amsterdam, London, New York, San Francisco, Shanghai and Washington DC. For more about AKQA, visit www.akqa.com.

Contact: Molly Parsley, AKQA, +1-(415)-645-9473 or molly.parsley@akqa.com or Hester Bloch, AKQA, +44(0)20-7780-4857, hester.bloch@akqa.com

Source: AKQA

Molly Parsley, +1-415-645-9473, molly.parsley at akqa.com, or Hester Bloch, +44-0-20-7780-4857, hester.bloch at akqa.com, both of AKQA