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NUREMBERG, Germany, Jan. 28, 2026 /PRNewswire/ -- An innovative game concept, the highest quality of workmanship and attractive market potential – all these criteria are combined in the six outstanding product ideas that were honoured with the prestigious ToyAward on the second day of Spielwarenmesse. In the Baby & Infant category, Tonies won with My First Tonies. In PreSchool, the game Der Berg ruft by Auzou jeux/Hutter Trade came out on top, while Franckh-Kosmos took the lead in the SchoolKids category, with Temple Twist. In the Teenager & Adults category, iDventure claimed the winner's podium with CluePuzzle – The Wonderbox of Alice. The Startup category was won by Beaver Edu SAL with its Beaver Edu Construction Kit. In addition, the Arches by Waytoplay Toys was recognised in the Sustainability category.
This year's winners were selected by an international jury composed of twelve experts from the fields of retail, industry, market research, toy safety and sustainability. The members evaluated the submitted innovations according to the criteria of play fun, safety, originality, potential for retail success, comprehensibility of the product concept as well as workmanship and quality.
Baby & Infant Category (0-3 years)
My First Tonies, Tonies
The soft, easy-to-grasp figures from My First Tonies introduce children from the age of one to wonderful sound worlds. By listening to short stories, toddlers can jump from branch to branch with monkeys. The Farm Box also delights young listeners while helping expand their vocabulary in a playful way. "A combination of age-appropriate storytelling and sensory stimulation," enthuses the jury.
PreSchool Category (3-6 years)
Der Berg ruft, Auzou jeux/Hutter Trade
The engaging game, Der Berg ruft, introduces children up to six years old to the trendy sport of climbing. Two climbing teams compete on a vertical wall. Players must estimate rope lengths for each move while keeping track of all their team members. This develops dexterity and strategy. The jury commented: "A coherent overall package with engaging and varied gameplay."
SchoolKids Category (6-10 years)
Temple Twist, Franckh-Kosmos
The cooperative game Temple Twist demands clever teamwork. Players must locate a temple's treasure chambers, while the temple can rotate and change each turn, transforming into an impenetrable 3D labyrinth. The jury's judgement: "This entertaining game impresses with its innovative concept and high quality."
Teenager & Adults Category (ab 10 Jahren)
CluePuzzle – The Wonderbox of Alice, iDventure
CluePuzzle – The Wonderbox of Alice combines classic 3D puzzling with escape-game mechanics. Over 180 wooden pieces create a functional puzzle box with locks and moving elements. Clues and logic tasks are integrated into the box's design. The multi-step gameplay challenges logic, and spatial thinking. "A particularly successful combination of puzzle and riddle," according to the jury.
Startup Category
Beaver Edu Construction Kit, Beaver Edu SAL
With the Beaver Edu Construction Kit, children become little tinkerers. Using thin real wood sticks and plug-in joints, they can create either the 22 suggested designs or their own constructions. With the patented cutting tool, children can cut their sticks to size without risk of injury. The jury emphasises "the combination of technical thinking and crafting."
Sustainability Category
Arches, Waytoplay Toys
Arches stands out for its simple, curved shapes that allow children to build bridges, hills, or imaginative figures. The innovative click system holds the pieces firmly together, yet they can be easily taken apart. "Made from recycled plastic in Europe Arches combines sustainability with playfulness. Its clever geometry and high-quality manufacturing offer great potential and stimulate creativity," the jury concludes.
NUREMBERG, Germany, Jan. 28, 2026 /PRNewswire/ -- An innovative game concept, the highest quality of workmanship and attractive market potential – all these criteria are combined in the six outstanding product ideas that were honoured with the prestigious ToyAward on the second day of Spielwarenmesse. In the Baby & Infant category, Tonies won with My First Tonies. In PreSchool, the game Der Berg ruft by Auzou jeux/Hutter Trade came out on top, while Franckh-Kosmos took the lead in the SchoolKids category, with Temple Twist. In the Teenager & Adults category, iDventure claimed the winner's podium with CluePuzzle – The Wonderbox of Alice. The Startup category was won by Beaver Edu SAL with its Beaver Edu Construction Kit. In addition, the Arches by Waytoplay Toys was recognised in the Sustainability category.
This year's winners were selected by an international jury composed of twelve experts from the fields of retail, industry, market research, toy safety and sustainability. The members evaluated the submitted innovations according to the criteria of play fun, safety, originality, potential for retail success, comprehensibility of the product concept as well as workmanship and quality.
Baby & Infant Category (0-3 years)
My First Tonies, Tonies
The soft, easy-to-grasp figures from My First Tonies introduce children from the age of one to wonderful sound worlds. By listening to short stories, toddlers can jump from branch to branch with monkeys. The Farm Box also delights young listeners while helping expand their vocabulary in a playful way. "A combination of age-appropriate storytelling and sensory stimulation," enthuses the jury.
PreSchool Category (3-6 years)
Der Berg ruft, Auzou jeux/Hutter Trade
The engaging game, Der Berg ruft, introduces children up to six years old to the trendy sport of climbing. Two climbing teams compete on a vertical wall. Players must estimate rope lengths for each move while keeping track of all their team members. This develops dexterity and strategy. The jury commented: "A coherent overall package with engaging and varied gameplay."
SchoolKids Category (6-10 years)
Temple Twist, Franckh-Kosmos
The cooperative game Temple Twist demands clever teamwork. Players must locate a temple's treasure chambers, while the temple can rotate and change each turn, transforming into an impenetrable 3D labyrinth. The jury's judgement: "This entertaining game impresses with its innovative concept and high quality."
Teenager & Adults Category (ab 10 Jahren)
CluePuzzle – The Wonderbox of Alice, iDventure
CluePuzzle – The Wonderbox of Alice combines classic 3D puzzling with escape-game mechanics. Over 180 wooden pieces create a functional puzzle box with locks and moving elements. Clues and logic tasks are integrated into the box's design. The multi-step gameplay challenges logic, and spatial thinking. "A particularly successful combination of puzzle and riddle," according to the jury.
Startup Category
Beaver Edu Construction Kit, Beaver Edu SAL
With the Beaver Edu Construction Kit, children become little tinkerers. Using thin real wood sticks and plug-in joints, they can create either the 22 suggested designs or their own constructions. With the patented cutting tool, children can cut their sticks to size without risk of injury. The jury emphasises "the combination of technical thinking and crafting."
Sustainability Category
Arches, Waytoplay Toys
Arches stands out for its simple, curved shapes that allow children to build bridges, hills, or imaginative figures. The innovative click system holds the pieces firmly together, yet they can be easily taken apart. "Made from recycled plastic in Europe Arches combines sustainability with playfulness. Its clever geometry and high-quality manufacturing offer great potential and stimulate creativity," the jury concludes.
** The press release content is from PR Newswire. Bastille Post is not involved in its creation. **
Spielwarenmesse honours outstanding innovations with the ToyAward
HONG KONG, Jan. 29, 2026 /PRNewswire/ -- Taboola, a global leader in delivering performance at scale for advertisers, today announced the findings of a major field study conducted in collaboration with researchers at Columbia University, Harvard University,Technical University of Munich, and Carnegie Mellon University. The research provides the first-ever look at how generative AI (GenAI) compares to human creativity in driving consumer action by analyzing large-scale real-world ad performance.
While GenAI has revolutionized production speed and cost, its impact on actual performance has remained a subject of intense debate. The new study, titled, "AI Ads That Work: How AI Creative Stacks Up Against Humans," analyzed hundreds of thousands of live ads running on Realize, Taboola's performance advertising platform, totaling more than 500 million impressions and 3 million clicks.
Key insights from the academic research include:
- GenAI ads perform just as well as human-made ads: AI-generated ads performed just as well as human-made ads. In raw data, AI ads saw a slightly higher average click-through-rate (CTR) (0.76%) compared to human ads (0.65%), though they performed comparably when researchers applied the tightest statistical controls.
- AI ads win the most when they don't "look" like AI: AI-generated ads that did not "look like AI" achieved the highest engagement of all groups, significantly outperforming both human-made ads and AI ads that were perceived as artificial.
- Human faces are the "secret ingredient" for trust: The study found that one of the most important factors in making an ad feel "human" and trustworthy was the presence of a large, clear human face. Interestingly, based on Taboola's best practices and policy restrictions, AI-generated ads were more likely to include these trust cues than their human-made counterparts.
- Brands no longer have to choose between speed and quality: AI-generated visuals increased or maintained click-through rates without reducing downstream conversion performance, proving that advertisers do not have to trade quality or conversions for production scale.
- Food, drink, and finance brands were among the first to adopt AI ads: Specific sectors; most notably, the "food and drink" and "personal finance" industries were early to adopt AI ads.
"Taboola's platform provided us with a literal gold mine of real-world data that is simply unavailable in a lab setting. By analyzing over 500 million impressions, we were able to move past the hype of GenAI and uncover its real impact in large scale settings," said Oded Netzer, Vice Dean for Research, Columbia Business School. "Our findings prove that when AI is used to enhance human cues—like the trust found in a human face—it doesn't just match human performance; it often sets a new ceiling for engagement."
Methodology
The study utilized a quasi-experimental "sibling ads" approach, comparing matched pairs of AI-generated and human-made ads created by the same advertiser for the same campaign on the same day. This methodology allowed researchers to isolate the impact of the GenAI creative while controlling for external variables like the identity of the advertiser, timing, audience targeting, and landing pages.
About Taboola
Taboola empowers businesses to grow through performance advertising technology that goes beyond search and social and delivers measurable outcomes at scale.
Taboola works with thousands of businesses who advertise directly on Realize, Taboola's powerful ad platform, reaching approximately 600M daily active users across some of the best publishers in the world. Publishers like NBC News, Yahoo, and OEMs such as Samsung, Xiaomi and others use Taboola's technology to grow audience and revenue, enabling Realize to offer unique data, specialized algorithms, and unmatched scale.
** The press release content is from PR Newswire. Bastille Post is not involved in its creation. **
New Study: AI Ads Match Human Creative in Major Report from Columbia University, Harvard University, Technical University of Munich, and Carnegie Mellon University; Taboola Data Shows AI Wins by Appearing Authentically Human and Prioritizing Visual Trust Signals
