With a record 40,133 entries, it will be tougher than ever to win a Lion in Cannes this year. Still, some of the year's best marketing ideas are already surely earmarked for Lions—with tech innovations, potent celebrity endorsements and gender debates leading the way.

Adweek partnered again with Leo Burnett for this annual preview of front-runners for hardware at next week's Cannes Lions International Festival of Creativity.

Burnett has its own prohibitive favorite, of course, with Always "#LikeAGirl" for Procter & Gamble, which has already won numerous top awards this spring. And there are many other delights among these 20 contenders, from tech innovations (many focused on safety, from Optus' "Clever Buoy" to R/GA's Hammerhead work) to celebrity endorsements (Beats by Dre, Under Armour, etc.) to memorable campaigns around gender and women's empowerment (a topic that gets its own coveted prize with the inaugural Glass Lion).

And then there are the wild cards—work that comes out of nowhere to win, and won't be on any pre-festival lists. Visit adweek.com/cannes all next week to see the winners—well known and not—as they announced, along with our real-time reports from the festival.