People were invited to download our mobile app, Hadia Time, and keep their phone locked for as long as possible between 7pm and 10pm each night which is family time during Ramadan.

For each minute they kept their phone locked, Lenovo donated a minute of data to a migrant worker in the Middle East, so that they could call their families back home.

This tackled two contrasting problems at the same time. On the one hand, migrant workers who don’t get to speak to their families enough are given the means to contact loved ones back home.

On the other, people who are so glued to their screens that they ignore the family right in front of them have a good reason to put their device down. But they were not asked to sacrifice any of their own data, which made it a win-win situation.

People are predisposed to donating during Ramadan. So we developed Hadia Time, a mobile app that was in keeping with the spirit of Ramadan.

Lenovo is aware of both the virtues and the vices associated with its product. But turning the vices into virtue meant giving people an opportunity to spend less time on their phone and donate that time into data for workers who really needed it.

The app was promoted on popular sites, was easy to download in English or Arabic, and ran for the month of Ramadan. Hadia Time translates into English as (Gift of Time) so the name of the app itself encouraged uptake.

It allowed people to give generously but effortlessly, because none of their own data was actually used. Whilst it required a small sacrifice of online time by users, Lenovo actually donated data based on the number of minutes saved.

People spent 2,855,984 million minutes away from their smartphones and with their families (1,983 days/ 66 months), the equivalent of 5.5 years.

That meant the equivalent of 5.5 years of family time was donated to migrant workers.

We reached 5,127,035 Million Video Views on Facebook & YouTube

21,300,000+ impressions

31,235 App Downloads

The App reached the number 1 spot in KSA in the Lifestyle Category, outranking prayer apps in Ramadan.

As a brand, Lenovo got important temporary real estate on all the phones of those who downloaded the app, in the form of a branded platform.

It created tremendous goodwill among migrant workers – a group for whom mobile phones are an important tool for adapting to a new environment.

The app encouraged a positive behavioural change, as family time is central to Ramadan.