Nissan leveraged its status as a Co-Presenting Partner of the NBA Japan Games 2022 through an integrated activation programme spearheaded by the unveiling of a ‘ProPilot Mop’ to the in-arena audience during a surprise half-time experience that showcased the latest iteration of its driver assistance technology.
Powered by the auto company’s ProPilot 2.0 driver assistance technology, the ‘ProPilot Mop’ on-court stunt was introduced to the ticket-holding hoops audience during an unexpected half-time experience at the ‘NBA Japan Games 2022 presented by Rakuten & Nissan’.
Bringing to life Nissan’s ‘With The Power Of Technology, Accelerating The Enthusiasm’ brand slogan, the surprise in-arena performance demonstrated the auto manufacturer’s advanced driver assistance technology.
The in-arena initiative, developed in harness with agency TBWA\HAKUHODO Tokyo, began quietly as a team of unobtrusive court cleaning staff appeared holding their ‘ProPilot Mops’ which, to the audience’s surprise, they then released and the mops began automatically travelling around the court floor doing their job unaided. The court cleaners then revealed themselves as half-time, branded-backed entertainers who danced alongside the mops. The stunt even offered fans an opportunity to serve as an official court sweeper at the NBA Japan Games.
Powered by Nissan Intelligent Mobility’s ProPILOT 2.0 technology – the company’s vision for how cars are powered, driven, and integrated into society in the future – the demonstrated showcases Nissan’s hands-free route driving assistance technology linked to high-precision map data. The initiative saw the brand and agency team input the dimensions of the basketball court into its mapping route technology and add a sensor-based function for precise positional control to the actual court mops: enabling the mops to cruise around the floor of the court automatically following a predefined route avoiding contact between mops, obstacles and the dancers.
To promote and share the activation to a wider audience beyond those in the arena, TBWA\HAKUHODO created a campaign spearheaded by a hero film sharing the excitement and showcasing the mops and the dancers which dropped on 20 October.
“The first time I experienced a car journey powered by Nissan’s ProPILOT 2.0 and taking my hands off the wheel, I felt a sense of thrill and excitement I had never felt before. Inspired by this feeling, the focus for the creative output was to recapture the emotion of surprise and delight, Nissan technology elicits – this time on the basketball court,” said TBWA\HAKUHODO Senior Creative Director Nobuhiro Arai. “At interval, the traditional time the mopping and cleaning begins – gradually, a strangeness occurs in the mopping movement, and finally the mops move around by themself once released from hands, just like magic. From the ordinary to the extraordinary, from humdrum to astonishment. The audience’s amazement convinced me this experience was a major turning point moment, not only in the performance at NBA Japan Games, but a game changing moment in the audience’s mind of what powered by Nissan’s technology really means.”
The campaign was created by a team at TBWA\HAKUHODO which included Chief Creative Officer Takahiro Hosoda, Senior Creative Director Nobuhiro Arai, Art Director Yosuke Sugioka, Copywriter Ryo Kobayashi, Producer Yutaka Sato, Strategists Takanori Akahoshi, Taira Yano and Yuzuki Miyata, Social Managers Reiko Saito and Takuto Kawamura, PR Manager Yukinobu Tanida, Event Coordinators Mineo Mori and Kenji Kurosu, Digital Manager Shunpei Nakayama, as well as input from Shinsuke Inazumi, Kunio Baden, Toshihiro Sekiya, Ryusuke Taira, Ryotaro Kawaguchi, Riku Kurashita and Rikuto Yoshida.
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The audience reaction is a testimony to the activation’s success: with fan faces starting with surprise and then showing amazement and delight as they cheered Nissan’s stunt from the stands and, of course, took plenty of smartphone shots which they spread socially.
The ‘ProPilot Mop’ follows in the footsteps of a series of (much awarded) concepts inspired by Nissan Intelligent Mobility technologies and created by TBWA\HAKUHODO such as the ‘ProPilot Golf Ball’, the ‘Intelligent Parking Chair’ and the ‘ProPilot Park Ryokan’ ( which featuring self-parking slippers).
As a presenting partner of the NBA Japan Games 2022, which took place between 30 September and 2 October, Nissan’s rights package included in-arena and on-court branding and the ProPilot Mop was one of several fan activations, experiences, competitions and giveaways rolled out during the event to add to fan excitement and experience and to promote the car company’s innovative brand positioning.
Nissan was one of a record 13 brand partners supporting the NBA Japan Games 2022 9which saw the 2022 NBA champion Golden State Warriors play two p[reseason games against the Washington Wizards). The others were Rakuten, 2K, American Express, Hennessy, Hokka, Instyle Group, NEC, Nike, SAP, ServiceNow, Sun Chlorella and Tissot. The event celebrates the game of basketball and the NBA and focuses on the convergence of the league and the sport with popular, contemporary culture.
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