# Nike Never Done Evolving feat. Serena

> Nike’s simulated Serena-versus-Serena final drew 1.7M YouTube viewers, WPP claimed.

- Owner: Nike
- Kind: Campaign
- Sector: Sports
- Seed date: 2022-08-11
- Milestone date: Week of Aug 11, 2022
- Date basis: Documented milestone; not a measured attention peak. Some dates are known only to the week, month or year.
- Spread Score: 29 (Niche, provisional), v1.3
- Mechanics: Newsjacking, Pairing, Platform jump, Controversy

## Summary

Nike streamed an AI match between two eras of Serena after her retirement announcement. Trade coverage and a video review followed, and WPP claimed 1.7M YouTube viewers. The film won the Cannes Digital Craft Grand Prix and entered a museum exhibition.

## Timeline

- 2022-08-09 — Serena Williams (Press) — Williams announced that she was leaving professional tennis.
- 2022-08-11 — Nike / AKQA (YouTube) — Nike streamed a virtual match between machine-learned versions of Serena from 1999 and 2017.
- Week of Aug 11, 2022 — Milestone: Clube de Criação (Press) — Clube de Criação reported the YouTube broadcast and its use of Stanford’s vid2player technique.

The full timeline, metrics and sources are on the case page, or via the Pro API (https://howitspread.com/mcp#api).

Canonical URL: https://howitspread.com/cases/nike-never-done-evolving-serena

Cite as: How It Spread (2026). “Nike Never Done Evolving feat. Serena.” Case HIS-01744. Spread Score v1.3: 29/100. Updated 2026-10-26. https://howitspread.com/id/HIS-01744