MUMBAI: The Cannes Lions festival has announced that it will change its creative slogan from “The International Advertising Festival” to “The International Festival of Creativity”, which reflects the widening scope of the event.

The move reflects the transformation of Cannes Lions over the last few years as the event now recognises creative excellence not just in advertising but in all forms of communications.

Originally known as the International Advertising Film Festival with only TV and Cinema ads being judged, the Festival has changed in recent years to embrace communications in the broadest sense.

The organisers of the events explained that this change comes as a response to industry feedback to make its tagline more relevant.

"If you view the work and listen to the conversations taking place at Cannes Lions, you realise very quickly that the event has evolved way beyond pure advertising," says Festival CEO Philip Thomas. "Apart from the welcome attendance of Design, Media, PR, Activation and other professionals from all forms of communications, the winning work at Cannes can no longer be described as being simply ‘Advertising‘. Many of the Grands Prix are now being awarded to experiences, technologies, social media, user-generated content, services, events – the options for marketers now are rich and diverse, and we need to embrace that change. It‘s important that Cannes Lions offers a global event that is relevant to the industry, and having listened to feedback from many industry leaders, we feel that now is the right time to truly reflect what the Festival has become.”

Next year 13 categories that will be honoured are film, press, outdoor, cyber, media, direct, radio, promo & activation, design, PR, film craft, titanium & integrated and the recently launched creative effectiveness.