Shortlisted 2016

TECHNOLOGY & TELECOMS

Brand

VODAFONE GMBH

Lead Agency

MEC GMBH

24HR RACE FROM NÜRBURGRING

The Challenge

The Vodafone network is invisible. You can’t touch it. You can’t photograph it. Therefore you have to experience it. Always connected to the brand campaign “Coverage when you need it”. Our challenge was to find an event, that has international fans and comes with a load of passion. We were sure our network can deal with every sport worldwide.

By selecting the 24h race at the Nürburgring, we sure can say the challenge couldn’t have been bigger.

The Strategy

The 24h race at the Nürburgring is one of the most exciting motorsport events in the world. A race on a legendary track which tells stories of passion, success and failure and sees technical innovations and maximum performances of both, people and equipment. The special status of the event, however, was not reflected in its media coverage. Until 2015.

Vodafone took race fans as close to the race as never before. By delivering images from the track and out of the selected drivers’ cars. Stress level data, additional cameras and popular motorsport experts added up to an outstanding live broadcast experience. All enabled by Vodafone’s LTE technolgy, all internationally viewable on YouTube. In HD. In English and
German. No mobile network has ever delivered a comparable power.

The Implementation

Vodafone partnered up with the event and sports TV channel Sport1 and got the international rights for digital live streaming that allowed coverage in English to reach even more fans worldwide.

Vodafone created spectacular 26h live content right from the race track.
3 mobile base stations for installed for perfect 4G coverage.
4 cars were equipped with SIM cards for the onboard coverage and a drone with 8 SIM cards that provided aerial views.
Special race suits monitored the drivers’ pulse and stress levels and transferred it to the stream.

Being that close to the driver – a one-of-a-kind experience. On Twitter, Vodafone owned all conversations by promoted hashtag #n24h.

The Result

The project had overwhelming success.

Not only that 98% of all comments for the livestream were positive, but the numbers also beat every branded live content case. Nearly 2m users were attracted by the YouTube livestream.

Sport1 did embed the Vodafone signal into it’s linear TV and website, their users demanded it (6,7m more contacts). The signal was also streamed into HbbTV (world premiere), where 23k users saw the stream. 45m users were reached via Twitter, over 10m via Facebook.

The buzz volume of the race trippled vs. 2014 – thanks to Vodafone’s coverage. Twitter Germany awarded #n24h as most successful campaign ever.

Let’s wait for May 2016, when the 24h race will stop again at the Nürburgring.