AU UNLIMITED FUTURE LABORATORY

Short List
TitleAU UNLIMITED FUTURE LABORATORY
BrandKDDI CORPORATION
Product / ServiceWEB COMMUNICATION
CategoryI01. Integrated Multi-Platform Campaign
EntrantHAKUHODO Tokyo, JAPAN
Entrant Company HAKUHODO Tokyo, JAPAN
Advertising Agency HAKUHODO Tokyo, JAPAN
Production Company TYO Tokyo, JAPAN

Credits

Name Company Position
Genya Sunouchi Hakuhodo DY Media Partners Creative Director
Takeshi Fukui HAKUHODO Inc. Planner
Kentaro Harano HAKUHODO Inc. Art Director
Hirotaka Tanabe HAKUHODOInc. Account Executive
Kenji Takeda TYO Inc. Producer
Jun Mitomo TYO Inc. Planner
Naoyuki Araki TYO Inc. Planner
Yuta Tsukada TYO Inc. Production Manager
Tatsuto Nakamura TYO Inc. Web Engineer
Nobuaki Arikata kirifuda Inc. Web Engineer
ITO SOUKEN Office Editor
FUMM Hackathon Team Planning
Shunsuke Aoki YUKAI Engineering Inc. Hardware Engineer
Nobuaki Ito YUKAI Engineering Inc. Hardware Engineer
Takayuki Fukatsu THE GUILD Application Engineer
Hiroki Kokubun THE GUILD Application Engineer
Yuta Uchiyama THE GUILD Application Engineer
Tetsuya Matsuda freelance Shoes Craft
Hidenobu Tanabe freelance Director
Masahiko Atsumi TOW Inc. Producer

Creative Execution

au Unlimited Future Laboratory created actual items in a hackathon upon discussing futuristic products online with consumers. Through such activity, a concept model, known as futuristic pair of kids’ shoes “FUMM”, was developed with support from external partner “NewBalance”. Sensors built into the shoes detect the color of the ground and the movement of children such as walking, jumping and climbing. Responding to their movements fun sounds such as locomotive and piano are played from the parent’s smartphone connected with Bluetooth. It is a product that turns an everyday walk for a child into a small adventure.

The developed FUMM was announced as a concept model. “FUMM KIDS PARK” where people can actually wear FUMM and play was opened. It acquired media exposure including seven TV programs, indicating successful media coverage comparable to that of a rollout of new smartphones. The survey result showed that brand preference toward au by those who are aware of FUMM increased by 25 points compared to those who are not aware of FUMM. It was proved that development of futuristic IOT products by consumers and external partners contributes to branding. It is currently being examined to make FUMM into a product.

Due to the similarity of smartphones sold and price system provided, communication carriers have difficulty differentiating itself from other companies. KDDI, which is the No.2 communication carrier in Japan, was looking for activities that increase preference toward its au brand. In such a situation, an activity to develop futuristic products that consumers desire was carried out together with consumers who feel that “communication carriers are all the same”. Following the trend of the society of democratization of manufacturing due to 3D printers, and future-oriented minds represented by the Tokyo Olympic, open innovation platform “au Unlimited Future Laboratory” was opened to develop futuristic IOT products.

Links

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