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South by South West in Austin, Texas is divided into three festivals or conferences; Music, Film and Interactive. It’s the Interactive part that most of our industry seems to descend on every year but that Interactive title doesn’t do it justice.

SXSW Interactive is where technology, creativity, culture and business come together and the output is, quite simply, a vision of the future that is here now. There are plenty of marketing related conversations, but so much more, something that reflects the increasingly complex relationships between products and services, technology, marketing and people.

Ogilvy London this year was out in force with 10 of us ranging from Creative, Digital, Social , UX and Planning taking in the inspirational speakers, workshops and keynotes across the 5 day event. This was my second time at SXSW and the content of the conference had just exploded this year. This could be to do with the increasing

dialogue and interest from agencies to properly embrace innovation and try to stay on top of upcoming trends and technology that consumers are sure to adopt and which therefore, they need to be sharing with their Clients.

I have collected together a bite size overview of everything from SXSW that Ogilvy should be thinking about, considering and embracing over the next year to 18 months. From trends in innovation, through to the future of air travel and the expanding start up cultures around the world, Please enjoy!

Some scary stats...- SXSW Started in 1987- The interactive aspect of it has been going for 20 years- There were over 1000 Conference talks over 5 Days - 30,000 attendees just for Interactive - 3x More than 5

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South By South West 2013Ogilvy London Labs Report By Will Harvey

@WilliamEdHarvey

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Leap MotionGesture-enabled computerThe hardware that stole the show was arguably the Leap Motion.First announced 6 months ago, Leap is a tiny motion detection device that sits beneath your monitor and allows the user gesture interaction with a number of supported apps.

The Leap allows pinpoint accuracy not seen before (imagine Microsoft Kinect on steroids..). With its simple set up and

ever-growing list of supported apps. the soon to be shipped device stole the hardware centre stage this year.

Developers are already going crazy for the potential use of this compact box of sensors. By using Leap you could enable any OOH display to be controlled by gesture alone, for a miniscule cost - £59 - vastly undercutting its competitors.An affordable gesture display device opens up stacks of possibilities for richer more engaging experiences for users, through the use of a more natural mode of interaction.

Trends Of SXSWWhat should we be aware of in 2013?Big DataThe one Big phrase that stood out across the board this year at SXSW was un-doubtedly Big Data! From small talks about devices that capture our daily movements, to what we upload, share and view online. Data is continuing to be generated everywhere, but the buzz this year was about how we must start to identify and use it effectively, with real purpose. The concept of BD is not new to SXSW, but the consensus seems to be that it’s only truly valuable when used to create positive behavioral change through insights into human behaviour and therefore help to streamline methods of communication process through data mining. It was timely that BD was such a hot topic, as Ogilvy London Lab is already driving just that as part of our next Lab semester! ( June 6th) Our goal – to inspire and inform a number of our brands about the importance of BD and how to use it correctly.

Twitter’s impact on TVAs social media starts to gain its way into more and more aspects of our everyday lives, there is no doubt that Twitter has altered our TV consumption and how that’s measured. In the talk ‘How has Twitter changed how we watch TV’ Jenn Deering from Union Metrics, spoke about the convergence that happens through social media channels (specifically Twitter). Viewers now have a space to engage with one another and even characters/stars of the shows. 1 in 3 of every tweet is about a TV programme world wide, and the programme with the largest tweets per min recorded was the U.S teen drama series ‘Pretty Little

Liars’ - 30K tweets per min. on its final season.Brands are now adding visual #hashtags to top and tail commercials, thus making them able to easily measure social conversations relating to them live and see the online impact through simple analytics of their consumer interaction.

The rise of AirBnBLast year AirBnB made a huge impact on a very small group of key early adopters, with huge media coverage post event. This year it took the more general audience of SXSW by storm! AirBnB allows you to find local rooms and houses to rent for short periods of time directly from owners and residents themselves.I actually stayed at an AirBnB back in 2012, and did so again this year – so easy to book, great location and great people. This whole area of a more collaborative, social economy is an exciting new space to watch and may easily challenge the big budget hotel chains in major cities.

VineThe new social media platform for 2013 was Vine. Their # was used over 14,000 times in 5 days, and they were identified as being the most talked about online trend across all channels for Day 1 of the event. Vine allows users to create a 6 second burst of video to then be viewed on Twitter! The fun, quick, quirky experience of the user capturing an event just adds to its charm, so watch this brand.

Angry CatViral Videos and Internet sensations come and go in the blink of an eye. The 2013 SXSW viral hit (and slightly over used) was Angry Cat. Interestingly it generated more chatter in the social space than any other speaker or technology from the event. May have had something to do with the quick thinking of the Mashable team, who tracked down a ‘physical’ Angry Cat and brought him to SXSW for fans to have their picture with him!

“We generate so much data in our daily lives but right now it’s disjointed”Rick Orr - Founder of Tabbedout

“50% of the 40 bn. apps downloaded through the app. store were downloaded only in the last year! ”Thomas Fellger-CEO of Iconmobile

With a wave of your handThe ten-finger-trackable motion controller demonstration shows millimetre-accurate capabilities and has highly impressive smoothness.

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Google GlassGoogle glass is a computer built into your glasses and allows a number of features: Photo and video capture, message dictation, map overlaying, speak to translate, live video calling and display notifications from your phone.Since Google announced the Google Glass project over a year ago, the internet has been awash with sightings of Google employees and management seen out in the wild sporting pairs of the ‘heads up’ display glasses. However, very little actual evidence or visuals had been seen except for the occasional tease or Google skydiving Video event ‘Hangout’.

So, one of the most over-subscribed and highly anticipated talks was from the GG team, delivered by Timothy Jordan - Senior developer. He gave us one of the first live views of what to expect from the “ambitious” release by end 2013. Seeing the Glass demo live & its expected features really brought to life the possibility of overlaying digital info. onto our analog world. What will make or break the uptake will surely be whether the distraction of 2 sets of messages will work….

Smart FabricsFashionable technology has been mooted for a few years now; the idea of making the cloth we wear day-to-day smarter and reactive is of high interest to the Fashion industry. This year was no exception. The huge success of products like Nike’s fuel band and Jawbone seem to be bringing all the hype to a reality at last. Tech Designer Jennifer Darmour from Artefact spoke about their developments in weaving technology into our clothing, allowing users to program a series

of commands and linked gestures into their clothing. So, when they draw a circle on their sleeve with a finger it texts their partner “I am going to be late” or a triangle would email a parent to say “I can’t wait to see you”.

Google Smart TrainersWithout a doubt, the maddest announcement at SXSW was the partnership between Google and Adidas for a ‘smart trainers’ project. Focusing on connected objects the ‘Art Project’ looked at how a computer is embedded into a pair of trainers, to then connect to your ‘phone and allow automated posting to your social media networks updates The connected trainers also have an AI personality to them, verbalised through a speaker built into the tongue of the trainers. So, if you were walking slowly then started to run or jump, the trainer would speak out from the trainers themselves and tweet things such as “that’s more like it” and “I love the feeling of wind in my laces” It was to be fair called an ‘Art Piece’ by Google and is unlikely to become a real product range, it did show the most extreme use of connected clothing! It does however illustrate that the big players feel that Smart clothing is here to stay.

“In a group of early adopters the question isnt ‘do you track?’ but ‘How many trackers are you wearing right now’ ”Syuzi- Blogger, FashioningTech

Wearable TechnologyTechnology is the next Fashion statement

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Eye spyGoogle glass was out in force this year at sxsw. spotting them among the crowds on most days was very easy

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“I would like to die on Mars.... Just not on impact”Elon Musk - Founder of Space X

A surprising focus this year for a number of panels was our re-interest in space and the new possibilities for travel it might offer. There were 12 different Space-focused talks and multiple mentions in other sessions. The two major keynotes pulling most attention were Elon Musk speaking about his Space X and Astro Teller about Google X Space elevator.

Humanity’s interest in space travel has been a roller-coaster ride from the first moon landing nearly 50 years ago. There are a number of nations, all trying to go bigger, better, further faster with space exploration. Since NASA announced it would no longer have a space program, the privatisation of space travel has been a extremely hot topic, with a number of big names like Richard Branson (Virgin), Jeff Booze (Amazon) and Elon Musk (Paypal) developing their own space projects.

Elon Musk headed up the keynote on Day 2. He spoke about his own project Space X and its recent successful trip to deliver supplies to the international space station. He outlined too the more ambitious project to colonise Mars! He came across as a very driven individual, with a very focused goal to not just put man on Mars but to actually start to colonize it.His drive and motivational view on life was infectious, so when he spoke about the serious doubts his investors had about the project and how he had set a specific goal to have the first privately owned shuttle by end 2012. Through grit and

determination, and only a couple of months late in February 2013 he showed the sceptics it could be done! That has now sparked a multi trip contract from NASA to deliver supplies to the ISS until 2016!

Another space program that has been big in the news recently has been Richard Branson's perspective on commercialising space travel - Virgin Galactic. The project aims to run re-usable commercial flights into space in a craft that can hold 8 people. Originally announced back in 2009, (and with a number of successful test flights over the last 2 years) they plan to start commercial flights by the end of 2013. Already with an undisclosed number of tickets bought for the proposed flights, there seems to be real interest in participating in space travel.

In a recent interview, Branson spoke about his project and what the future could hold for the everyday person. With Galactic’s shuttles going in to the outer atmosphere, the potential of London to New York in an hour and a half and not 8 makes mass market superfast travel a real possibility!Another example of brands using space and human’s interest in it was the recent Red Bull Stratos project, in that Skydiver Felix Baumgartner took a balloon into the edge of earth’s atmosphere and freefell back to earth. The project was backed and branded by Red Bull and was a perfect example of Branded entrainment as well as breaking new ground in brand sponsorship.

Space Next step for consumers?

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3D Laser ScannerMakerbot Releases Digitizer to compliment printer rangeMakerbot is the Brooklyn-based company that for the last few years have brought out a series of innovative 3D Printing products for the consumer market. This year at SXSW Bre Pettis the founder of Makerbot, took stage as the opening keynote speaker and announced its most ambitious new produce to date the 3D Digitizer!The Makerbot Digitizer is a desktop 3D scanner that will allow you to scan a

physical object and digitize it into a 3D object on your computer.

This is really exciting if you pair it up with the 3D Printer, as users would be able to put an object in the scanner, scan it, send it to 3D printer and print it all in their own home. This revolution could mean a huge disruption to the consumer product space with people replicating products at home, and with that a whole new form of piracy and copyright infringement of physical objects presents itself.... I suspect that this will cause much debate and who knows, legislation?

Physical / DigitalWorlds collide!3D printing

With 3D printing a 3D digital design from your computer can be turned into a 3 Dimensional object.3DP is said to be a game changer for the manufacturing industry, with many people calling it ‘The birth of Manufacturing 2.0’ with its possibility to disrupt everything we know about supply and demand. There have been various forms of 3D printing around for some time, but in the last year there is a massive influx in affordable 3D printers for the home, or small businesses. Most noticeable player in this market is the Brooklyn-based Makerbot whose CEO spoke as part of the opening keynote this year. A basic starter 3DP is around £1100 and creative ideas can almost instantly become physical objects. They even opened the first 3Dprinting store in New York last year. You can go in, get your head scanned and get a printed miniature made up on the same day. A 3DP in the back of a British Gas van at a consumer’s home and could print a spare part needed there and then! A prototype for NPD packaging is achievable now.

Beam Video conferences

The idea of Video conferencing or even virtual Doctors isn’t a new concept but Beam take it to the next stage and create physical moving conference units, controlled by the user on the other end of the call (see above image) . This allows a truly mobile virtual presence that is already being trialled by a few hospitals in the US. This unlocks the possibility for

other industries like teaching, more time-efficient lectures beamed between countries with a more of a physical presence, not just on a screen!

Jawbone UPCompetitor to Nike Fuelband, Jawbone UP which goes a few steps further. The simple wrist band that pairs with your smart phone, helps you to get to know yourself better through monitoring your sleep patterns, 24/7 activity tracking and even mood and food inputs. It then uses an insights engine database to help you to eat more healthily, wakes you up when best in your sleep pattern and to plan a more effective fitness scheme.Allowing technology to monitor and track our daily behaviour could really open up potential for more personalised services and products and offers. A

Digital Health client could partner with them to providing more accurate products to help with a balanced lifestyle and accurate treatment for vitamins and supplements.

Tweeting bikes

For the last couple of years agencies have been trying to create something fun, playful and theatrical for SXSW and after last year’s BBH homeless WiFi campaign someone had to step up their game. Razorfish certainly did that with their #UseMeLeaveMe project. They provided free bicycles for attendees with a twist. A bike tweeted its location when it had been left unused for a certain time. Attendees would find one nearby using the hashtag, ride it to their destination then leave it for the next person, the bike continued then to tweet out for the next person to come and ride!

“New Technologies are enabling us to blend our digital and physical worlds”Warren Kronberger - Director of Research and development , The Marketing store

3D scannerMakerbot announced the release of their first consumer level desktop digitizer .

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“Stop trying to be the next Twitter, start being the first you!”Chris Taylor Games Designer & Entrepreneur

“Need startup ideas? Attack a problem in a fundamentally different way, and attack the influences”Tim O’Shaughnessy

The Start-up culture around the world has exploded after the .com revolution of Silicon Valley. It has fuelled a number of cities own take off, New York’s Silicon Alley, Tel Aviv Silicon boulevard and London’s Silicon roundabout near Old Street are three of the most significant.London’s start up space has already had a number of successes such as Unruly Media, Moshi Monsters and Moo.com.This year there is a lot of chatter about what next from London. The Tech scene counts for 8% of the UK’s GDP. With the world’s eyes on London (after its move up from 7th to 5th most influential start-up ecosystem) what’s next is so exciting for those of us who live here!!

Incubation spacesOver the past 3 years, a number of incubation spaces have popped up around London, from Universities like Ravensbourne housing start-ups, to tangible collaborative desk spaces forming, such as those at the Brewery, The Trampery and Google Campus. There are a number of spaces and groups positively promoting and encouraging entrepreneurship, making start-up dreams a reality by helping incubate tiny companies within larger organisations. It’s something a number of Agencies such as Mother and AMV have been doing for some time, to enabale them to be able to offer a more diverse and unique offering to their clients.

Hackney HouseHackney House is a free, open space in Shoreditch for start-ups, which offers users free wifi and power to encourage cross-collaboration of skill sets. This year at SXSW it hosted a pop-up space open all day for people to drop into any of the talks, sessions and workshops.This was facilitated by Hackney Council, who have now partnered with Austin to encourage international start-up possibilities.

Digital ShoreditchNow in its 3rd year Digital Shoreditch is a festival held in the heart of London’s start up scene and looks to bring together a wide mix of skill sets, companies and knowledge under one roof. Each day focuses on a specific subject e.g.’ What is Tech City’, ‘Tomorrow’s World’, ‘Capital & Growth’ and ‘Future Brands’. This year it will be held in Shoreditch Town Hall and Ogilvy are again proud to be a sponsor and run the final day of the event, based around ‘Behavioral Change’ headed up by the Ogilvy Change team.

Want to Know More? We hope you found this report interesting and perhaps came across some interesting findings you can use. If you would like to know more, please get in contact. Will.harvey@ogilvy.com

@WilliamEdHarvey

Start up CultureAll eyes are on London

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