Award Case | No Isolation - Internationaler Deutscher PR-Preis 2019

Home alone - in the middle of life

An avatar as a connection to the outside world

No Isolation developed the telepresence avatar AV1 for seriously, often chronically ill children and young people who have to spend most of their time in hospitals or at home. AV1 uses a camera and microphone to transmit what is happening in the classroom to the child's tablet via Wi-Fi or LTE. It reports back via an LED signal and actively participates in lessons via a loudspeaker. For an initial test phase in Germany, data protection concerns in schools and education ministries had to be resolved and interested educational institutions had to be won over for pilot projects.

If a child falls seriously ill at the age of nine and misses two years of school due to treatment, their classmates will eventually be eleven, but the sick child will still be nine.

Karen Dolva, co-founder and CEO, No Isolation

The task

For AV1 to be widely accepted in schools in the future, it must first prove itself in pilot projects. However, this is not easy, because in data protection-sensitive Germany, you can't simply place a networked avatar on the school desk and have it streamed live.

PR had three problems to solve:

  • generate interest among affected parents and create goodwill among the other parents in the class
  • reduce concerns among teachers and school authorities up to the state education ministers
  • activate possible cooperation partners who can help with the financing of AV1

Our approach

1

Media relations sets the scene

Briefings from high-reach media such as BILD, Die WELT, T-Online, dpa, Handelsblatt and Tagesspiegel by the co-founder and CEO of No Isolation, Karen Dolva. (March 2018)
2

Real use cases demonstrate the importance to take action

Affected families who struggled with school authorities and ministries for permission to use AV1 were put in touch with regional print and TV & radio editors. (April-June 2018) 

Results

1,5
million reach in the first 4 months in print & online reporting.
16
pilot projects were initiated through our PR work. 
Tier 1
reports in print and online media, radio and TV, in which affected families had their say, demonstrably exerted pressure on political decision-makers and dispelled data protection concerns.

In data protection-sensitive Germany, even a piece of technology with such positive connotations as No Isolations AV1 must first prevail over official concerns. This was achieved with the help of the AV1 launch campaign with very limited resources.

With a small budget, the media presence set a powerful lever in motion that cleared blockades at schools and political authorities. Thanks to the campaign, children with long-term illnesses can be hopeful that they will be alone at home in future, but still in the middle of life.

Selected coverage

Stellvertreter in schwieriger Zeit

11.07.18 | Frankfurter Allgemeine Sonntagszeitung

Karen Dolva bringt kranke Kinder dank Robotern in die Schulklasse

21.08.18 | Handelsblatt

Roboter vertritt kranke Kinder im Klassenzimmer

28.08.18 | Deutschlandfunk

Per Livestream vom Klassenzimmer ins Krankenhaus

22.09.18 | Süddeutsche Zeitung

Marisol hat Krebs. Deshalb geht jetzt ein Roboter für sie in die Schule

26.05.19 | Stern

Wie Avatare Schwerkranke vor Isolation bewahren

28.02.19 | Ärztezeitung

Wie ein Roboter Lucas im Klassenzimmer vertritt

06.06.19 | Tagesspiegel

Roboter geht für kranke Kinder in die Schule

16.09.16 | Bild

Berichte über Betroffene im TV

05.03.19 | Volle Kanne, ZDF
09.05.18 | Landesschau, SWR
What can we do for you?

An award-winning campaign

This success was worth an award in the “Technology & Innovation” category to the jury of the DPRG's International German PR Award 2019. The campaign was also nominated for the award in the “Public Affairs” category. There were further nominations in these categories at the PR Report Award 2018 (PDF reader of the nominees) and in 2019 at the European Excellence Award.