Cannes Neurons Awards – World AI Cannes Festival 2025

Objectives: 

This year, the Cannes Neurons Awards are redefining their mission with a focus on innovation and sectoral impact. The competition highlights the most cutting-edge AI projects in four strategic areas: banking and finance, manufacturing, retail, and healthcare - sectors where AI has the potential to revolutionize practices and deliver innovative solutions. However, we remain committed to our original goal of recognizing a project with significant impact through the AI For Good Award, which will be awarded to an outstanding AI project for its positive contribution to society or its environmental benefits. This new direction emphasizes the role of AI not only in technological innovation but also in creating societal and environmental value.

 

Awards: 

• Banking & Finance Award

• Manufacturing Award

• Retail Award

• Healthcare Award

• AI For Good Award 

The jury will select one winner per category from the entries submitted for the Cannes Neurons, in accordance with the criteria detailed below. The awards will be presented during the gala dinner on the opening day of the event, on February 13, 2025.

Awards and benefits for Cannes Neurons winners

Each winner will be awarded the prestigious “CANNES NEURONS" trophy and will have the option to choose between a booth on the startup village at the 2026 edition or three Full Passes invitations to the event. In addition to this recognition, winners will benefit from enhanced online visibility and public relations support to showcase their achievements. 

Participants: 

The Cannes Neurons competition is placing exclusive focus on startups, recognizing their vital role in driving innovation within artificial intelligence. Our mission is to support and highlight these young companies developing cutting-edge and disruptive AI projects.

To be eligible in the Startup category for the Cannes Neurons competition, a company must:

• Be less than 5 years old as of January 1, 2025,
• Report annual revenue below 2 million euros for the year 2023,
• Employ fewer than 80 people.

Selection Criteria

Startups will be evaluated based on several key factors:

• Innovation: the uniqueness and disruptive potential of the proposed solution
• Customer impact: the tangible benefits delivered to clients and/or consumers
• Sector contribution: the relevance and value of the project to its ecosystem and industry
• Project maturity: the stage of development and readiness for market adoption
• Performance: demonstrated or projected economic and operational success
• Emphasis on real-world Application
• Trustworthy AI: adherence to principles of transparency, fairness, and ethical standards in AI development and deployment.

The jury will prioritize projects that demonstrate practical applications of AI, with a focus on solutions that have a tangible and measurable impact in their respective fields.

This approach reflects our belief that startups, due to their agility and innovative capabilities, are ideally positioned to address the challenges of today and tomorrow in key sectors. By focusing on these emerging companies, we aim to foster innovation and accelerate AI adoption across critical areas of the economy.

 

Jury 

In order to evaluate the applications, a jury of experts in artificial intelligence will select the winners in January.

If members of the jury are representatives of an applicant or partner company or organization, they will automatically be declared abstainers on the scoring of the project in question. 

Assessment criteria  

To accurately evaluate the projects, they will be scored according to previously established criteria, including:

The “AI” nature of the projet  

• Automated 
• Assisted 
• Augmented 
• Autonomous 

The innovative nature 

• In the professions (marketing, logistics, production, finance, legal, innovation...), tools (Open Source), uses (customization, improvement...) and economic models (BtoC, BtoB, BtoBtoC or multi-faceted market) 
• New analyses provided (Data Scientist approach) 
• Benefits observed by the stakeholders  

The assessment of the AI approach 

• Funding (private/public)  
• AI project deployment scope (specific segment, large-scale deployment...) 
• Economic and financial gains 
• Futurs steps and developments 
• Other information about the project (newspaper articles, patent filed...) 

Trustworthy AI

• Transparency: clear AI processes, data and decisions
• Fairness: minimizing biases for fair user treatment 
• Privacy: strong, regulation-compliant data protection 
• Accountability: systems to track, explain, and address AI decisions

Eligibility rule

It is important to note that previous years' finalists will no longer be eligible to participate in subsequent editions of the competition.

Conduct 

The application form is now available on the event website. You can now fill it out online until December 20, at 11:59 pm UTC+1. No application received after this date will be considered. 

If you have any questions, feel free to contact Tais ARNOULD at tais.arnould@rxglobal.com