Cannes Chimera 2013 Winners Announced

Y&R Singapore has been named among the Cannes Chimera 2013 Challenge Winners; just 8 projects selected from 900 entries each receive a prize of up to US$100,000.

Now in its third year, the Cannes Chimera global communications challenge is set by the Cannes Chimera Initiative, a partnership and a competition focused on finding innovative communication approaches that can help address critical global development problems.

Y&R Singapore’s winning team, comprising young talents Emir Shafri, Mervin Ng, Hisashi Matsui and (the not so young) Marcus Rebeschini, will next month travel to Seattle for a unique workshop with the Cannes Chimera, who will help take the ideas to a new level. Each winning team will then be invited to come back to the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation with a proposal for further funding of up to US$1 million to implement the idea.

“Last year, a bunch of us got together with a seemingly crazy idea and ended up being 1 of only 2 agencies in Asia to be shortlisted in Cannes’ coveted Innovation Lions category. Just days later, when the agency received the Cannes Chimera brief, we immediately seized the opportunity to solve a pressing problem for the world. By winning the Chimera Challenge, and close to US$100,000, we now have the chance to make another crazy idea happen. It's opportunities to do work like these with a cool bunch of people that gets me out of bed every morning,” commented copywriter, Emir Shafri, part of Y&R Singapore’s winning team.

The creative brief was launched during the 60th Cannes Lions International Festival of Creativity in June 2013, with a bid for new communication concepts that can incite the public to support an emerging international agenda to ensure that extreme poverty is virtually eliminated by 2030. 

900 ideas from 79 countries were received in answer to the Help Lead the Fight Against Extreme Poverty brief. Facilitated by Cannes Lions, the entries have gone through a vigorous judging process by the Cannes Chimera, comprised of the Cannes Lions 2013 Grand Prix winners.

The winning projects are:

• The Share Exchange by Young & Rubicam, Singapore

• Good Cents by Joe Public, South Africa

• The GAP index by venturethree, United Kingdom

• The Act Button by Naked Communications, Australia

• $1.25 cube experience by JWT, Israel

• Gamers VS Poverty by DFCB Digital, The Philippines

• One Two Five by PHD International, United Kingdom

• We See Women by Vital Voices Global Partnership, USA