Cannes Lions International Advertising Festival

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Logo of the Cannes Lions International Advertising Festival.

The Cannes Lions International Advertising Festival (IAF) is generally regarded as the most prestigious international advertising festival. The 5 to 7 day festival is held annually in the city of Cannes, France, usually in the third week of June, with 2006 marking the 53rd occasion the festival has been held. Although the festival also features seminars, workshops and social events for people in the advertising industry, the primary purpose of the festival is to present the Lion awards for the advertisements and advertising campaigns adjudged the best of the year. Although the award ceremony is held in France, the company that conducts the festival is British.

Lions are awarded in a number of categories, including cinema/television, print marketing, outdoor advertising and direct marketing. The festival introduced an award category for online media in 1998, known as the "Cyber Lion". Curiously, the festival only created a category for radio advertising in 2005. In 2006 "Promo Lions" were added and in 2007 "Integrated Lions" will be added.

The festival also has categories for overall advertising campaigns and for technical achievement. In each case a Gold Lion is awarded to the top entrant in that category. A final "Grand Prix" for best advertisement of the year will then be awarded to one of the Gold Lion winners. Additionally, Lions are awarded in various subcategories, such as for specific market segments (eg. charities) or for specific attributes of the advertising (eg. "Best Use of Music".) The festival also awards an annual "Palme d'Or" to the top agency for the year.

Advertisements are generally entered by the agencies that created them, although technically anyone can enter any advertising creation. Judging is then conducted by juries composed of advertising creative directors from around the world, and the jurors are instructed to reward the advertising that is most creative both in idea and execution. Each jury is headed by a jury president. Recent jury presidents in the film category include Bob Isherwood (Saatchi & Saatchi) and Dan Wieden (Wieden + Kennedy). Jurors are disqualified from voting on entries from their own country.

In 2004, festival owner Roger Hatchuel sold the IAF to British publisher and conference organizer EMAP plc for a reported £120 million. Terry Savage is the current Executive Chairman of the festival.