The creative idea is based on the insight, that it’s a natural behaviour to chew on the end of a pen when people are focussed. We took this insight and combined it with the technology of bone conduction. The result is an undercover radio device inside a regular ballpen that can be connected to mobile phones via bluetooth and allows people to enjoy a live radio broadcast without anybody else noticing. That way, people can sit in meetings and at the same time listen to one of the many live sports broadcasters on radio.net.

How it works:

Press the button on the pen for about 12 seconds – it will flash blue and red.

Turn on your phone’s Bluetooth and select “S5”. Wait for the LED to flash blue slowly.

Launch the radio.nett app and select a station, or play what you want.

The pen uses bone conduction technology to produce sound that is only audible to the person using it. As soon as people bite on the end of the pen and the sound is transmitted from the teeth to the jaw bone to the inner ear.

It is made of Polyurethane, contains a shortened lead and writes in black. The end is a customised cap with an ingrained pick up head. Inside is a modified Bluetooth headset, a battery and an attached downstream micro amplifier. After assembling, the shell was glued and painted with black dull varnish. It comes with a rubber cap for the inlying USB port and a control button also made of rubber. The logo of the brand is foil cut, green, on the side of the pen.

The production went from a rough dummy made of clay, to a casting mould to the final Polyurethane model.

Once the pen was featured on social media, it caused a massive raise in engagement within the fan base and social media community.

In summer 2018, the German people face an overwhelming thread to living out their two major passions in life: glorious football and hard work.

Because with the 2018 FIFA World Cup taking place in Russian time zones, play times will massively clash with German working hours.

Now the German people have two options:

Go to work and miss all the great football moments or skip work and miss all the important meetings. Neither option is really satisfying.

The brief was to come up with a solution that gives the German people an opportunity to bring their two passions together.