• by Steve McClellan  @mp_mcclellan, June 21, 2012

Interpublic Group’s RG/A took home one of two Grand Prix awards in the Cyber Lion category Wednesday night at Cannes for its work on the Nike + Fuelband campaign. Swedish agency Volontaire Stockholm was also awarded a Grand Prix in the category for work on a Swedish tourism campaign.

RG/A is credited with designing the metrics platform at the core of the campaign and a wrist band that consumers could wear to track their daily physical activity. The device allows users to set activity goals and Bluetooth synch technology was devised to transmit data from the users wrist band to the metrics platform.

Volontaire’s challenge was to position Sweden as a progressive country.

The shop created a user-generated “official communication channel” on Twitter that enabled ordinary citizens to tweet about developments in the country. The channel, @Sweden, garnered 26,000 followers from 120 countries in six weeks. Nearly 24 countries and cities followed suit, creating similar platforms. The PR value generated from the campaign was estimated at nearly $20 million.

An additional 85 Cyber Lions were awarded at this year’s festival, including 9 gold, 31 silver and 45 bronze accolades. Among the gold winners were campaigns for brands including Intel, Google, American Express, Honda Motors and consumer electronics giant Philips.  

All the winners are highlighted at www.canneslions.com.