LBB & Friends Beach: Better Together Panel Programme

11am

Adland and Marketing World are two countries divided by a common(ish) language - what marketers say they want and what agencies and production companies think they want can often be two wildly different things. We want to kick off our week of content at the LBB & Friends Beach by welcoming marketers into the creative conversation and giving them the platform to share how they’re manoeuvring the changing and growing demands on them to do more with less, what they’re looking for from partners, what they make of all the options out there in the agency and production world, and what creativity really means for them. 

Becky Verano, global VP marketing operations and capabilities, Reckitt

Erwin Dito, VP Global Brand, McDonald's

12pm

Competition is king in the marketing and advertising world. Competition for talent, for attention, for eyeballs and, in Cannes Lions, competition for creative dominance. And as technology accelerates and economies around the world wobble, that competition is fiercer than ever. It’s seeing businesses expanding into new areas - brands taking creative and media in-house, holding companies expanding their production scope, production companies hiring creatives and strategies.

But this is an industry that has always thrived on collaboration too. So how do we collaborate when it's more competitive than ever? Are we all trying to do too much? Does this benefit the client and the work?

Ali Brown, president, Prettybird

Andy Bird, founding partner and CCO, Le Truc, Publicis Groupe

Dan Dawson, chief creative officer, Grand Visual

Katie Potochney, executive creative director, Intuit Mailchimp
Lucia Grillo, chief integration officer, DDB

1pm

For too long the advertising and marketing world has been shutting out the fifth of the population that has a disability, both failing to make space for their creative voices and failing to make content and products that are accessible to all. Big brands and agencies that are making a commitment to inclusive design and accessible content tell us about what they’ve learned and what needs to happen across the industry so that it’s no longer a PR-worthy novelty but a part of the marketing world’s everyday work.

Alfonso Iglesias, Iberia CMO & head of eCommerce, Samsung

Caroline Foster Kenny, global chief client officer, Wunderman Thompson

Christina Mallon, principal director of inclusive design, Microsoft

Jeremy Lindley, global design director, Diageo

Toby Allen, executive creative director, The&Partnership

2.30pm

11am

Company culture is more important than ever. We keep hearing about the battle for talent and the fact that no-bullshit gen z, who prioritise wellbeing, have a clear sense of boundaries. But with the pitch churn accelerating, stagnating wages in the marketing and advertising sector, the volume of output growing and the demand for always-on creative, fostering appealing, healthy and productive cultures is a tough challenge that goes beyond any one company. Oh and did we mention the dispersed workforce and the difficulties of turning a cosy indie community into a culture that works on a global scale? We speak to some of the businesses that have built and nurtured cultures that can survive today’s pressures.

Jake Brody, senior managing director, Accenture Song

Joe Staples, CCO and partner, Mother

Nicole Taylor, SVP and head of Our Lego Agency (OLA), Lego

Steph Bruning, global marketing director, Framestore

12pm

Psychologists talk about creativity having four ‘Ps’: person, process, product and press (environment). So how do the world’s creative leaders think about these different aspects of creativity, and how do they fold them into their day-to-day work? Join us for a conversation that’s sure to get your own creative juices flowing, whatever your role in the advertising and marketing world.

Ali Rez, CCO MENAP, BBDO

Chaka Sobhani, global CCO, Leo Burnett

Daniel Bonner, global CCO, Wunderman Thompson

Debbi Vandeven, global CCO, VMLY&R

Jose Miguel Sokoloff, creative chairman, MullenLowe

1pm

2pm

Artificial intelligence has properly kicked off, with the likes of Adobe Firefly, ChatGPT, Midjourney and more shaking up the creative industries and offering up a not-too-far future where machine learning algorithms take on the heavy lifting of content creation. But rapid progress has left unanswered questions in its wake. Will AI enhance creativity or devalue it? And how will it transform the way we work together? Will it change marketers’ expectations of agencies and production companies? Will they even need them any more? What will it mean for up and coming talent when the ‘potato peeling’ work that provides an inroad to and ladder within the creative industry disappears? And if AI is our new creative collaborator, what does it mean for everyone else we work with?

Elav Horwitz, EVP, global director of applied innovation, McCann Worldgroup

Isabel Perry, VP of emerging technology, Dept

Jay Ganaden, director, strategic development for Pro Design, Adobe

Megan Lang, marketing director, Heinz North America

Mehta Mehta, global CCO, Hogarth/WPP

3pm

When it comes to diversity, equity and inclusion, the industry has talked a big game but progress has been slow. In a system rigged towards privilege, it can be an exhausting, uphill battle, but this is an industry of tireless problem solvers and brilliant ideas and initiatives abound. So, how can we as individuals and as part of that same system adopt and scale the solutions that work, stop talking and enact real change?

Ursula Mejía Melgar, marketing director - Southern Europe, Diageo

Victoria Ijeh-Allen, CEO and founder, Iconic Steps

11am

Brands need more content than ever, far more than the good old 30-second TV spot, so what does this mean for the industry’s high end commercial production companies? These days, brands need content and assets tailor made for multiple platforms and evolutions in tech and data mean that they’re also often looking for content that’s flexible and personalisable, and partners that are in it for more than the shoot. And while perhaps production houses can meet that need, and use craft to make content that’s truly engaging, it’s a conversation that’s not really happening. We want to bring together marketers and production companies, two parts of the industry that don’t often get the chance to talk, to chat about the business.

12pm

For years, creatives had a tendency to see data and creative as oil and water, sitting alongside each other but never really mixing. Now though, the promise of data-driven creativity is coming to life and opening up new frontiers. Better first and third-party data is giving creatives crunchier insights and it’s also encouraging some brands to take the plunge and test more and more ideas out in the real world, enhancing effectiveness. We’re speaking to creatives, data experts and marketers from brands, agencies, (and platforms) to talk about the reality of combining data with creativity and how to make sure that data is truly boosting creativity and not flattening it out.

Carren O'Keefe, CCO, Digitas

Kelly Abcarian, EVP, measurement & impact, NBCUniversal Media

Rob Lenois, CCO, VaynerMedia

Shyam Venugopal, senior vice president, global marketing & media transformation, Pepsico

Tina Allan, partner, data science and connections, FCB Global

1pm

The golden hour caught on film. A playful stop-motion sequence of charming hand-made puppets. A witty one-liner. We love beautifully-crafted work. But in an age where platforms are hungry for a never-ending stream of content, where brands and agencies are creating for all sorts of screens - and none, where content is geared towards commerce, where personalisation and interactivity is expected, where does that leave craft? Is it still an important value and how is it manifesting?

Cabell Hopkins, head of Rattling Stuff, Rattling Stick

David Rolfe, global head of production, WPP & Hogarth

Gemma Battenbough, head of APAC, brand partnership studios, twitch

Melissa Yang, global head of ecosystem partnerships, TikTok

Sergio Lopez, global head of production, Publicis Groupe

2pm

Virtual production is no longer a novelty. Big brands are using it to transform their marketing, produce bigger ideas, reduce their carbon footprint and, yes, save money. Marketing teams are racing to block book facilities and holding companies are stepping up with their own volume studios, and it is up-ending traditional production and VFX pipelines. Marketers, agencies and producers who have been using virtual production in a big way will share their insights and experiences to reveal how to make the most of it, what it can’t do and where the future of VP lies.

Eyvonne Carfora, executive producer, Alt.vfx

Krystina Wilson, executive vice president of advertising, Framestore US

Mathieu Nevians, creative director, BETC/Havas
Melania Kulczycka, client director, VuFinder Studios

Steffen Gentis, global production director, MCA / Reckitt

Wesley ter Haar, founder, MediaMonks

3pm

The in-house scene has exploded, bringing a new dynamic to the relationship between marketing, creative, media and production - unlocking a host of new challenges and opportunities. Each in-house agency set up is as unique as the brand it’s serving. Many thought it was a trend the industry would outlive but has it become a true evolution of marketing practice thanks to huge advancement in technology, a new remote workforce and a need to blend creative thinking with commerce? We sit down with leaders of in-house and external agencies to discuss the difference in culture, creativity and growth of these models in 2023 and beyond.

David Lee, chief creative officer, Squarespace

Jo Shoesmith, global CCO, Amazon

Richard Stainer, chief executive officer, global clients, OLIVER Agency

Tom Evans, head of The Kitchen North America, Kraft Heinz

Vida Cornelious, VP, creative, New York Times

11am

Theoretically, creativity is an economic multiplier that can boost business and drive sales and make money. Easy, right? But then when it comes to paying for it, it all gets a bit more complicated. We want to open up a dialogue about the value of creativity, and how it’s perceived in marketing departments and agencies. What’s really affecting marketers’ budgets? What impact has the wobbly world economy had in the last 12 months and what might be in store for us? Are agencies and production companies approaching how they charge in the most sensible way? And what’s the impact of treating creative as a cost rather than an investment?

Peter Reid, global CEO, MSQ Partners

Sam Hawkey, CEO, AMV BBDO

Samira Ansari, CCO, Deutsch NY

Will Cady, global brand ambassador, Reddit