Heineken Ignite: a project aimed at creating a memorable Heineken experience that unlocked the power and possibilities of mobile innovation and technology. The goal was to go beyond the creation of just another mobile application, think beyond the screen and find a solution that was robust, simple and needed no explanation in a nightclub setting.

Heineken Ignite, the world first smart beer bottle. It interacts with other bottles, its environment and the people around it, bringing together interaction, data and networking. The bottle uses micro sensors and wireless networking to sense the moment when a bottle is being used to say “Cheers”, people drinking or resting on the bar. The motions trigger light effects illuminating the swirls of beer, carbon dioxide and oxygen. Besides that it can be remotely controlled by specially developed DJ/VJ software, syncing the network of bottles to the music.

On January 30th we kicked off the ‘Spark’ process and engaged in a 3 day workshop with the Global Heineken Design team, specialists and independent experts from a wide range of industries. From the ‘Spark’ process, Heineken Ignite was born: a project that aimed at creating a memorable Heineken experience that unlocked the power and possibilities of mobile innovation and technology.

10 weeks after the workshops, on April 9th, we launched the prototype of Heineken Ignite during the Milan Design Week. The launch was filmed and a video was edited the same night. This video was not promoted or seeded to the public, it was only featured on a password protected Tumblr blog with the production story specially created for the press. The story went global in a matter of days.

Heineken Ignite is a prototype and not a stunt, the film of the prototype launch (shot and edited the same night) was not promoted to public. The Tumblr blog with the production story for selected press was password protected, but received 3.500+ visitors and the videos on YouTube a collective count of 200,000 within a few days. The story went global and Heineken Ignite was featured on 300+ blogs including mainstream titles like CNBC, Engadget and Huffington post. Heineken are now looking to roll out in nightclubs in 7 of their top 25 markets before the end of this year.