The Cannes Lions International Festival of Creativity 2025 reflected the key shifts transforming the global creative and marketing landscape. As brands navigate growing complexity, from technology disruption to changing consumer expectations, this year’s festival focused on how creativity is evolving to become more intelligent, inclusive, and impact-driven. Central themes included AI’s role as a creative collaborator, the convergence of media and commerce, and the increasing importance of trust, sustainability, and brand authenticity. This report, The Pulse of Cannes Lions 2025: Redefining the Creative Frontier, explores key themes that shaped the Cannes Lions 2025 dialogue, from reimagining creative partnerships and rising performance-driven storytelling to the need for compliance, transparency, and cultural relevance. It shows how marketing leaders are adapting their strategies to keep pace with disruptions, while delivering long-term brand value in an increasingly competitive and fragmented environment. In addition to synthesizing key insights from the event, the report includes Everest Group’s perspectives on what these developments mean for service providers, technology providers, and design agencies. It offers strategic recommendations on how these players can evolve their capabilities, reposition their offerings, and support clients in building agile, measurable, and future-ready creative strategies.

The Cannes Lions International Festival of Creativity 2024, stood as a pivotal event, spotlighting the profound impact of technology on the creative landscape. This year, the festival emphasized on the symbiotic relationship between technological advancements and creative innovation, heralding new paradigms in marketing and advertising. A distinct thematic thread emerged, highlighting the transformative potential of technology in the creative arena. From harnessing artificial intelligence to personalize and tailor content to the changing role of content creators in the marketing landscape, the festival showcased a plethora of innovative approaches. This report, titled "Cannes Lions 2024: How Technology is Driving Creativity to New Heights," delves deeper into this dynamic interplay between technology and creativity. By analyzing the key technology themes that dominated the Cannes Lions discourse, it offers a comprehensive exploration of the critical conversations, new innovations, and cutting-edge advancements presented during the event. The report further explores how these trends will propel the creative industry forward and provide insights to navigate this rapidly evolving landscape and leverage technology to craft impactful and future-proof campaigns. Scope All industries and geographies Contents In this report, we examine: Key themes shaping the future of creativity, including pivotal discussions and innovations from the Cannes Lions festival Impact of technological advancements, particularly AI on the creative and advertising landscape The growing importance of sustainability, DEI (Diversity, Equity, Inclusion), and purpose-driven initiatives in the creative industry, and how these elements are being integrated into marketing and advertising strategies Membership(s) Marketing and Interactive Experience Sourcing and Vendor Management