News & Events

CEA Challenge to Innovators: How Can We Recycle CRT Glass?

DATE: 04/26/2013

TAGS: Best Practice, Corporation, Crowdsourcing, Open Innovation

Article in ThomasNet News about CEA's Cathode Ray Challenge. The article features commentary from Christian Stevenson, InnoCentive’s Director of Premium Challenges, highlights the winners of CEA's first Challenge, and discusses the importance of this new Challenge which is open until July 1, 2013.

Consumer Electronics and Being Green

DATE: 04/22/2013

TAGS: Best Practice, Corporation, Crowdsourcing

A synopsis of the Consumer Electronics Association's (CEA) sustainability efforts including its work with InnoCentive on a couple of sustainability Challenges focused on old cathode ray tube (CRT) TVs.

Lumina Pairs With InnoCentive to Improve Post-Secondary Education

DATE: 04/03/2013

TAGS: Best Practice, Crowdsourcing, Not for Profit, Open Innovation

Article featuring an interview with Lumina Foundation's VP of Innovation, Kiko Suarez, focused on the recent launch of the Foundation's Open Innovation Pavilion, new Challenges, and overall strategic goals for the program.

Find a Sustainable Solution in the CRT Challenge

DATE: 04/01/2013

TAGS: Best Practice, Crowdsourcing, Not for Profit

The Consumer Electronic Association (CEA) recently launched part two of its Cathode Ray Challenge, this one focused on finding new uses for recycled glass. This article discusses both the current Challenge and previous one, including information about the winning Solvers.

EIT Innovation Competition Launches for Rail

DATE: 03/21/2013

TAGS: Crowdsourcing, Government

Article on the UK's Rail Safety and Standards Board (RSSB) Enabling Innovation Team (EIT) and its £1m competition to identify opportunities for innovation in service culture, business process, journey planning, the whole journey experience, and design of facilities. InnoCentive's Director Jonathan Slater is interviewed.

Open Innovation Challenge Aims to End Mass Atrocities

DATE: 03/13/2013

TAGS: Crowdsourcing, Government, Not for Profit

Insightful article by Crowdsourcing.org which dives into the USAID and Humanity United Tech Challenge for Atrocity Prevention, a technology competition featuring five distinct Challenges (of which three are being run on InnoCentive) which seek to enlist Solvers from around the world in support of the White House’s effort to design new tools to help prevent and respond to mass atrocities.

USAID and Humanity United Announce Round 2 of Tech Challenge for Atrocity Prevention

DATE: 03/06/2013

TAGS: Crowdsourcing, Government, Not for Profit

Three new Innovation Challenges which encourage individuals, groups, and organizations to apply technology-based solutions to the most significant issues surrounding atrocity prevention.

The Power of the Crowd (byline in Alliance Magazine)

DATE: 03/01/2013

TAGS: Best Practice, Crowdsourcing, Not for Profit

InnoCentive's Simon Schneider penned this insightful byline about the power of the crowd in the March 2013 issue of Alliance Magazine.

InnoCentive Interview on the John Batchelor Show

DATE: 02/20/2013

TAGS: Best Practice, Crowdsourcing, Open Innovation

InnoCentive's VP of Marketing Steve Bonadio is interviewed by Chris Riback about InnoCentive's unique business model and value proposition in this nine minute segment on the John Batchelor Show.

Thorny Research Problems, Solved by Crowdsourcing

DATE: 02/11/2013

TAGS: Crowdsourcing, Making the Business Case

Article in the Boston Globe focused on crowdsourcing innovation problems and featuring commentary by InnoCentive's marketing VP Steve Bonadio.

Thomson Reuters Hosts Challenge to Generate Ideas for Expanding the Scientific Discovery Experience on the Web of Knowledge

DATE: 01/25/2013

TAGS: Crowdsourcing, Open Innovation

Thomson Reuters launched a Challenge today titled "Seeking Creative Use Cases for Thomson Reuters Web of Knowledge." This $10,000 Ideation Challenge seeks use cases for Thomson Reuters Web of Knowledge content, tools, and APIs (Application Programming Interface) that would enable users to engage in creative new behaviors, beyond what is currently possible with online research portals. How will users want to search and discover scholarly content throughout the next 5 years?

Inside View: InnoCentive - Interview with Siobhan Gibney Gomis

DATE: 01/21/2013

TAGS: Best Practice, Crowdsourcing

InnoCentive's Senior Director of Operations and Deputy Head of EMEA, Siobhan Gibney Gomis, is interviewed by Business Because. "Like a football club and its fans, we are nothing without our Solvers," says Gibney Gomis.

Winner Revealed! The Economist-Nielsen Data Visualization Challenge

DATE: 12/10/2012

TAGS: Crowdsourcing

This Challenge asked the world to review Nielsen's global consumer data, generate insightful conclusions with broad implications, and present a compelling visual presentation of the most interesting ideas from the data. Over 4,000 Solvers from 101 countries signed up to participate in the Challenge, and of the hundreds of Solvers from around the globe who provided a solution, seven were chosen as finalists. The winning team was announced at The Economist World in 2013 Festival in New York City on December 8, 2012.

Solver Revealed! An Innovative Idea to Eradicate Polio

DATE: 11/29/2012

TAGS: Crowdsourcing, Not for Profit

Article featuring Solver Harvey Arbesman for his winning work on the recently awarded BeyondPolio Challenge. Mr. Arbesman was an InnoCentive Top Solver in 2010 and also provided a winning solution in the $1M Prize4Life ALS Biomarker Challenge.

Harvard Business Review: Are You Solving the Right Problem?

DATE: 11/19/2012

TAGS: Best Practice, Crowdsourcing, Open Innovation

InnoCentive CEO Dwayne Spradlin's September 2012 article in HBR posits that most firms aren't solving the right problems, or even asking the right questions, which undermines their innovation efforts. Courtesy of HBR, this article is now available to the general public until August 2013.

InnoCentive CEO Dwayne Spradlin to Present at Back End of Innovation 2012

DATE: 10/08/2012

TAGS: Crowdsourcing, Making the Business Case, Open Innovation

Dwayne will present “Harnessing Challenges & A World of Talent to Drive Tangible Value and Return-on-Innovation" at BEI 2012 in Boston. Part of the Return on Innovation track, Dwayne will present insights on how companies that leverage open innovation Challenges and crowdsource them to diverse audiences to solve R&D problems and accelerate product innovation, realize an exponentially greater return-on-innovation compared to organizations that have not adopted these proven techniques. Delegates who attend will gain insight into: (1) Proven and measureable customer results and return-on-innovation, (2) Efficiency and time savings as a result of running successful challenges and prize competitions, (3) Improved internal collaboration to align resources around solving key problems, and (4) Access to external talent which is otherwise non-existent in-house.

Innovating our Way to the Future: Dwayne Spradlin's Speech at TEDxHelvetia

DATE: 09/27/2012

TAGS: Best Practice, Crowdsourcing, Open Innovation

Dwayne Spradlin, CEO of InnoCentive shows how we can harness the potential of innovators across the globe through crowdsourcing. Using concrete examples from several domains, he presents custom-created solutions for specific problems and encourages us all to find the rocket scientist inside ourselves.

JDRF Announces Winners of the Glucose-Responsive Insulin Grand Challenge Prize

DATE: 09/17/2012

TAGS: Crowdsourcing, Not for Profit, Open Innovation

Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation (JDRF), the leading global organization focused on type 1 diabetes (T1D) research, announced today the winners of the Theoretical Phase of its first-ever public Challenge, which called for novel theoretical ideas to approach the discovery and development of glucose-responsive insulin (GRI) to treat diabetes. JDRF launched the $100,000 Challenge one year ago in partnership with InnoCentive.

Calling All Data Designers: The Economist Wants Your Visualizations

DATE: 09/12/2012

TAGS: Crowdsourcing

A Wired article about The Economist-Nielsen Data Visualization Challenge, featuring interviews with Sean McManus, director of programs at The Economist and Steve Bonadio, VP of marketing at InnoCentive.

Health Data Consortium Interview with InnoCentive CEO Dwayne Spradlin

DATE: 09/07/2012

TAGS: Crowdsourcing, Government, Open Innovation

The Health Data Consortium (HDC) is a collaboration among government, non-profit, and private sector organizations working to foster the availability and use of health data to drive innovations that improve health and health care. In this post, the HDC interviews Dwayne Spradlin, CEO of InnoCentive and a member of HDC’s Executive Committee.

Crowdsourcing data visualisations: On your mark, get set...

DATE: 08/21/2012

TAGS: Crowdsourcing, Innovation

This article on Economist.com delves into that idea that "people outside of the organizations that hold the data may have more creative ideas about how the information can best be presented." The article references The Economist-Nielsen Data Visualization Challenge currently underway on InnoCentive.com. To date, nearly 800 Solvers have already signed up to participate in this Challenge.

Challenge Solution Revealed! PopSci-InnoCentive Education Challenge

DATE: 08/15/2012

TAGS: Crowdsourcing

A year ago, the Popular Science-InnoCentive Education Challenge asked for lesson plans that could be used at the middle-school level in each of five areas of science that will be vital in the future. Materials couldn't cost more than $50, and the lesson needed to fit into no more than three 50-minute classes. Here, we proudly announce the solutions, winners, and runners-up.

Q&A: Dwayne Spradlin on leading “a marketplace of innovation,” InnoCentive

DATE: 08/06/2012

TAGS: Best Practice, Crowdsourcing, Open Innovation

SmartPlanet's Pure Genius Q&A featuring Dwayne Spradlin, CEO of InnoCentive. The article provides a thorough overview of InnoCentive, open innovation and how it works, as well as stories about successful Challenges.

App Detects Potholes, Alerts Boston City Officials

DATE: 07/20/2012

TAGS: Crowdsourcing, Government

Associated Press story on the successful outcome of InnoCentive's Street Bump Challenge with the City of Boston.

Gartner Report: InnoCentive Positions Itself as a Challenge Marketplace

DATE: 07/16/2012

TAGS: Best Practice, Crowdsourcing, Making the Business Case, Open Innovation

Case study of InnoCentive conducted by IT research firm Gartner. InnoCentive's general manager of EMEA, Simon Schneider, is interviewed in the report.

Open Innovation: Creating Through Community Creation

DATE: 07/03/2012

TAGS: Best Practice, Crowdsourcing, Open Innovation

Article by author Anton Root who spoke with a handful of open innovation leaders, including InnoCentive, and found that the path to expansion and eventual maturity of OI lies in the potential for collaboration and building like-minded and motivated communities of problem solvers.

The Alzheimer's Challenge 2012 Announces Winner for Open Source Innovation; $300,000 in Total Prizes

DATE: 06/20/2012

TAGS: Crowdsourcing, Not for Profit, Open Innovation

The Geoffrey Beene Gives Back Alzheimer’s Initiative (GBGBAI) today announced Ginger.io of Cambridge, Massachusetts, as the winner of the Alzheimer’s Challenge 2012. Ginger.io was awarded $175,000 to help further develop its idea for a behavioral analytics platform using a combination of a mobile phone application and web-based dashboard. Building on the success of this Challenge, GBGBAI is soon set to launch the Geoffrey Beene’s Rock Stars of Science Global Grand Challenge, the second in its series of prize-based Challenge competitions designed in coordination with InnoCentive.

InnoCentive Research Prizes Awarded!

DATE: 06/11/2012

TAGS: Crowdsourcing, Not for Profit

In December 2011, InnoCentive partnered with the Foundation for Prader-Willi Research (FPWR) to launch a Challenge seeking novel avenues for research into hyperphagia, or unregulated appetite, common in children with Prader-Willi syndrome. We are pleased to annouce the successful completion of the Challenge along with a video announcement of the winners, as well as provide open access to the actual winning solutions via FPWR's blog.

Feds Launch Contest Seeking New Type Of Health Monitoring Device

DATE: 06/08/2012

TAGS: Crowdsourcing, Government

This article explores how three federal agencies are trying to tap the creativity of the marketplace to develop a new breed of portable, light-weight, inexpensive sensors to better understand how individuals are affected by air pollution. Called the "My Air, My Health" Challenge, it is currently open to Solvers on InnoCentive.com.

NIH, EPA Announce Competition for Personal Air Pollution and Health Sensors

DATE: 06/06/2012

TAGS: Crowdsourcing, Government

A competition to create a personal sensor system that measures air pollution and a person's physiological response to it will offer cash awards to finalists, federal officials announced today. The goal is to help researchers, communities, and physicians better understand the connection between air quality and health. The "My Air, My Health: An HHS/EPA Challenge" is now open on the InnoCentive Challenge Center.

How Outsiders Solve Problems that Stump Experts

DATE: 05/02/2012

TAGS: Crowdsourcing, Open Innovation

An article on how "expertise in other fields [allows individuals] to think differently and more creatively than others." This article references the groundbreaking work by Dr. Karim Lakhani at Harvard Business School and also dives into how InnoCentive's customers such as Eli Lilly have achieved success via crowdsourcing problems to diverse problem Solvers.

Jonah Lehrer and the New Science of Creativity

DATE: 03/19/2012

TAGS: Crowdsourcing, Open Innovation

In this review of Jonah Lehrer's new book "Imagine" subtitled "How Creativity Works," the author highlights InnoCentive, and uses examples to show how outside thinking often leads to brilliant solutions.

How to Be Creative

DATE: 03/09/2012

TAGS: Crowdsourcing, Open Innovation

In this article about being creative, writer Jonah Lehrer suggests that "big breakthroughs often depend on the naive daring of outsiders" and highlights InnoCentive as an organization which is highly successful in solving difficult problems precisely because Challenges attract "outsider thinking."

Idea Turns Old TV Tubes into X-Ray Shielding Tiles

DATE: 03/01/2012

TAGS: Crowdsourcing, Innovation, Not for Profit, Open Innovation

In this article about the CEA Challenge to find new uses for recycled CRT glass, the authors discuss several of the solutions, including an idea to mix the crushed glass tubes with cement, to make tiles for X-ray rooms. There, the lead in the tiles would protect people from X-ray radiation, just as they did inside old TVs

Prizes With an Eye Toward the Future

DATE: 02/29/2012

TAGS: Crowdsourcing, Open Innovation

In this article about prize-driven innovation, writer Tina Rosenberg says "What eBay does for buyers and sellers, companies like InnoCentive do for problem solvers." The article explores the idea of open innovation bringing solutions forward that never would have been found otherwise, and the high likelihood that solvers from outside the Challenge domain will solve a problem that has eluded the experts in that field.

Innovation for the People, by the People

DATE: 02/22/2012

TAGS: Crowdsourcing, Government, Open Innovation

In this article about prizes and challenges as catalysts for innovation, writer David Bornstein highlights InnoCentive and the Air Force Research Lab's Vehicle Stopper Challenge. The article focuses on the federal government's innovation strategies, and addresses the question "How can governments unearth knowledge that's scattered far and wide and bring it together in a way that is useful for society?"

Street Bump app detects potholes, tells city officials

DATE: 02/16/2012

TAGS: Crowdsourcing, Government

The City of Boston's InnoCentive Challenge is featured in this story from CNN.com. For this Challenge, the City of Boston asked Solvers to develop an algorithm that would accurately predict the location of potholes based on data collected from volunteers' smart phones.

Street Bump: An App That Automatically Tells The City When You Drive Over Potholes

DATE: 02/15/2012

TAGS: Crowdsourcing, Government, Open Innovation

This FastCompany article features the Street Bump mobile app developed by the City of Boston in collaboration with InnoCentive. The story recognizes the Solver, Ed Aboufadel, a Professor at Grand Valley State University.

5 Ways Small Businesses can Innovate Like the Big Guys

DATE: 02/15/2012

TAGS: Crowdsourcing

This byline by InnoCentive CEO Dwayne Spradlin provides five tips to help small and medium businesses to level the innovation playing field with their larger competitors.

Crowdsourcing science: Could you be part of the next big breakthrough?

DATE: 02/13/2012

TAGS: Crowdsourcing, Government

In this article, from NRC Canada's Dimensions Magazine, features InnoCentive Solver Andrew Trivett. In addition to being a prolific Solver, Andrew uses Challenges to advance the studies of his class at the University of Prince Edward Island, where he is a math professor.

Boston Asks for the Public's Help in Fixing Potholes

DATE: 02/13/2012

TAGS: Crowdsourcing, Government

Coverage of the City of Boston's Street Bump Challenge, which was recently solved. The Street Bump Challenge is a great example of governments using the crowd to deliver better services to citizens, and to invite participation so people can have a hand in improving their own cities.

Crowdsourcing for Science, Medicine and Government

DATE: 02/13/2012

TAGS: Crowdsourcing

InnoCentive CEO Dwayne Spradlin is interviewed on InnovationHub along with noted Harvard Business School Assistant Professor Karim Lakhani and InnoCentive customers City of Boston and Prize4Life. This in depth interview covers the history of crowdsourcing and two real-world examples of how issuing a Challenge to the crowd is changing the world.

A call for a 21st-century battlefield stretcher

DATE: 02/10/2012

TAGS: Crowdsourcing, Government, Open Innovation

The Air Force Research Lab has again reached out to the InnoCentive Solver Community for solutions to a critical problem. Since the Civil War, the Air Force has used the same technology for medical stretchers used in combat. Now they are seeking a new technology that will provide faster, safer, more reliable outcomes in the field. This Challenge has truly captured the imaginations of Solvers and the media.

Air Force 'Batman' Wants a 21st-Century Battlefield Stretcher

DATE: 02/10/2012

TAGS: Crowdsourcing, Government, Open Innovation

In this article, journalist Jeremy Hsu writes about the AFRL stretcher Challenge, and the need for the Air Force to innovate in the field of combat rescue.

Organizations Capitalize on Collective Intelligence

DATE: 01/18/2012

TAGS: Crowdsourcing, Open Innovation, Social Innovation

New research from IBM highlights InnoCentive's partnership with The Economist as an example of "businesses using collective intelligence to speed up company growth, improve efficiency, enhance products and services, and strengthen the employee environment." According to The Economist's Justin Hendrix, “The quality and the volume of [responses] we got back were just extraordinary. In each of the cases so far, we’ve had very high quality responses. People take the InnoCentive process seriously, and respond accordingly,”

Crowd-Sourcing Yields Ingenious Solutions for Air Force Research Lab

DATE: 11/07/2011

TAGS: Crowdsourcing, Government, Open Innovation

The Air Force Research Lab's work with InnoCentive is profiled, including a video of InnoCentive CEO Dwayne Spradlin talking about open innovation in government.

The Air Force Challenge to protect soldiers in rapid descent featured on Today

DATE: 10/21/2011

TAGS: Crowdsourcing, Government

The Today Show's web site features an AFRL Challenge that aims to protect soldiers from harm when descending a rope quickly.

How to Accelerate Innovation through Challenge Driven Innovation

DATE: 10/17/2011

TAGS: Crowdsourcing, InnoCentive Book, Open Innovation

In this article featured on Innovation Management, InnoCentive's senior marketing director Steve Bonadio dives into Challenge Driven Innovation, an innovation framework that enables companies to solve problems faster, more cost-effectively, and with less risk.

Lilly's Opening Moves - Science-Business eXchange

DATE: 10/13/2011

TAGS: Crowdsourcing, Open Innovation

An article about Lilly's Open Innovation Drug Discovery platform, an initiative with the goal of applying a crowdsourcing approach to finding new small molecules from external investigators that fit the company’s core disease focus areas. The program is one of several forays that Lilly has made into open innovation, the other most notable being the founding and eventual spin-off of InnoCentive. The article quotes InnoCentive founder Alph Bingham, formerly VP of sourcing innovation and R&D strategy at Lilly, about the proliferation of open innovation in drug discovery.

Crowdsourcing Cracks AIDS Mystery, What's Next?

DATE: 09/27/2011

TAGS: Crowdsourcing, Open Innovation

In this interview with InnoCentive CTO David Ritter, David Carr discusses the phenomenon of gamification, and the fact that InnoCentive has been using these concepts for years to solve Challenges for Businesses.

White House Reports on Success of Air Force Research Lab's Challenge

DATE: 09/02/2011

TAGS: Crowdsourcing, Government, Open Innovation

In this blog posted on whitehouse.gov, Alok Das of the Air Force Research Laboratory discusses the successful outcome of a Challenge focused on stopping uncooperative vehicles. Interesting Solver and solution details are provided in the post.

InnoCentive CEO Dwayne Spradlin Interviewed on MYOB Radio Show

DATE: 08/10/2011

TAGS: Crowdsourcing, Innovation, Open Innovation

Longtime entrepreneurs Rick Brutti and Jeffrey Davis host Mind Your Own Business (MYOB), a radio talk show focusing on entrepreneurs, their stories, and a host of topics of interest for entrepreneurial businesses. In this segment, the hosts interview Dwayne on InnoCentive's unique value proposition and the power of open innovation and crowdsourcing to solve problems that matter.

Businesses open up to social innovation

DATE: 08/02/2011

TAGS: Best Practice, Corporation, Crowdsourcing, Open Innovation

In this article from ZDNet Asia, InnoCentive is highlighted as a business that helps companies "not only access diverse knowledge of the crowd, but also reduce the cost of task execution and externalize the risk of failure."

Gartner Next Practices: Crowdsourcing Talent

DATE: 07/21/2011

TAGS: Best Practice, Crowdsourcing

Gartner analyst Jim Holincheck looks beyond traditional human resources (HR) practices to help organizations achieve improved business outcomes via crowdsourcing.

Google Again Tries Q&A Service; Cash Prizes

DATE: 07/15/2011

TAGS: Crowdsourcing, Open Innovation

InnoCentive President and CEO Dwayne Spradlin interviewed by Pete Barlas about Google's re-entry into the prize-based Q&A space.

Google's Prizes.org Awards Cash for Ideas

DATE: 07/07/2011

TAGS: Crowdsourcing, Making the Business Case, Open Innovation

A review of Google's Prizes.org includes an interview with InnoCentive CTO David Ritter about the potential of crowdsourcing to improve business processes and advance scientific research.

XChange Public Sector: Why Large Federal Programs Fail

DATE: 06/17/2011

TAGS: Crowdsourcing, Government, Open Innovation

A review of William Eggers’s (global director of Deloitte Services Research Public Sector) book "If We Can Get a Man on the Moon: Getting Big Things Done in Government" that includes an example of NASA using InnoCentive for technology problems.

How Your Small Business Can Leverage Open Innovation And Crowdsourcing

DATE: 06/15/2011

TAGS: Crowdsourcing, InnoCentive Book, Open Innovation

Chief Innovation Evangelist Stephen Shapiro interviews CEO Dwayne Spradlin on the American Express (AMEX) Open Forum about open innovation, crowdsourcing, and The Open Innovation Marketplace book.

Latest Thought Leadership Report on Grand Challenges

DATE: 06/14/2011

TAGS: Best Practice, Corporation, Crowdsourcing, Open Innovation

InnoCentive’s own Steve Bonadio, Gabriel Eichler, and Dwayne Spradlin dive into the definition and benefits of Grand Challenges, the essential requirements for a successful program, pitfalls and obstacle avoidance, and examples of Grand Challenges in action. (registration required)

Closing the Digital Divide

DATE: 06/07/2011

TAGS: Crowdsourcing, Innovation, Social Innovation

An article encouraging the use of Cyber schools to combat illiteracy. The Economist and InnoCentive Challenge, 21st Century Cyber Schools, is mentioned.

Think hard, invent something, win a prize

DATE: 05/27/2011

TAGS: Crowdsourcing, Government, Open Innovation

A blog post reiterating that online contests are a great version of performance-based contracting, and mentions NASA using InnoCentive for their contests.

Open Innovation Marketplace — A book review

DATE: 05/13/2011

TAGS: Crowdsourcing, InnoCentive Book, Innovation, Making the Business Case

A detailed review of the book “Open Innovation Marketplace” by Alpheus Bingham and Dwayne Spradlin.

Road Repair via Crowdsourcing

DATE: 05/13/2011

TAGS: Crowdsourcing, Open Innovation

An article describing the City of Boston’s Street Bump Challenge currently posted on InnoCentive.com, asking developers to improve the app to report potholes accurately.

The crowd factor

DATE: 05/12/2011

TAGS: Best Practice, Crowdsourcing, Making the Business Case, Open Innovation

An interesting article about introducing open innovation and crowdsourcing to jump-start innovation in the surf industry. The author is asking for seamless, slimmer, resilient wetsuits and environmentally friendly and surfboard materials and a host of other enhancements and innovations. She credits the World Wide Web and InnoCentive with the accelerating the use of crowdsourcing and cash prizes for "linking regular people with ideas to problems."

Taking My Personal Innovation Lifestyle to the Doctor

DATE: 05/11/2011

TAGS: Crowdsourcing, Making the Business Case, Open Innovation, Social Innovation

A blog about how open innovation can play a big role in disease detection and cure. The author talks about the Prize4Life and InnoCentive partnership and the winning ALS Biomarker Challenge.

Supercharging human ingenuity for sustainability

DATE: 05/05/2011

TAGS: Crowdsourcing, Innovation, Open Innovation

An article arguing for the use of competitions and open source to spur innovation in the sustainability space. InnoCentive is described as the "innovation pioneer" that has built a platform that promotes the "appetite for innovation."

Can We Crowdsource a Cure for Cancer?

DATE: 05/05/2011

TAGS: Crowdsourcing, Innovation, Making the Business Case

An article about the benefits of using crowdsourcing to find a cure for cancer. The writer mentions InnoCentive as a route to scale the crowd for their "adjacent areas of expertise" to find new ideas and solutions for scientific and industrial problems.

InnoCentive Links Problems and Problem-Solvers

DATE: 04/25/2011

TAGS: Corporation, Crowdsourcing, InnoCentive Book, Open Innovation, Social Innovation

An article about InnoCentive and the Challenge Driven Innovation process. The article also briefly describes our partnership with Popular Science and the new book by Alph Bingham and Dwayne Spradlin, The Open Innovation Marketplace: Creating Value in the Challenge Driven Enterprise.

Future pharma: Pharma’s new high-tech toolkit

DATE: 04/19/2011

TAGS: Corporation, Crowdsourcing, InnoCentive Book, Open Innovation

An article about innovative new ways that the pharmaceutical industry is using technology, including combating drug counterfeits, refining their sales techniques and improving their R&D using crowdsourcing and open innovation, such as the InnoCentive website.

InnoCentive: Creating Value in the Challenge Driven Enterprise

DATE: 04/11/2011

TAGS: Corporation, Crowdsourcing, InnoCentive Book

An interview with CEO Dwayne Spradlin about crowdsourcing and InnoCentive.

Can Open Innovation Save the Planet?

DATE: 02/22/2011

TAGS: Corporation, Crowdsourcing, Making the Business Case, Open Innovation, Social Innovation

An article about the InnoCentive and Environmental Defense Fund (EDF) partnership and the potential environmental benefits of crowdsourcing ideas and solutions business sustainability challenges. The OSRI & Sunnight Solar Challenges are mentioned.

Judith Rodin, President of the Rockefeller Foundation, on the Evolution and Promise of Social Innovation

DATE: 02/06/2011

TAGS: Crowdsourcing, Not for Profit, Open Innovation, Social Innovation

An interview with Judith Rodin about the benefits of [and future] of social innovation. She talks about InnoCentive as Rockefeller’s crowdsourcing partner for solving social problems and our role in this space.

Using Crowdcasting To Find Treatments For The Paralyzed

DATE: 02/04/2011

TAGS: Crowdsourcing, Making the Business Case, Open Innovation

An interesting article highlighting the value of using open innovation to not only advance drug development with regards to the ALS Solution, but also to “help recognize … and appreciate how much wisdom may be out there.” InnoCentive is recognized as a “the pioneering broadcast search platform.”

How open innovation networks can help solve scientific puzzles

DATE: 02/03/2011

TAGS: Crowdsourcing, Innovation, Open Innovation

An in-depth article about crowdsourcing, open innovation and “incentive prize contests.” The writer lists a number of open innovation sites, but predominantly concentrates on InnoCentive and InnoCentive Challenges as examples.

$1 Million to Inventor of Tracker for A.L.S.

DATE: 02/03/2011

TAGS: Crowdsourcing, InnoCentive Book, Making the Business Case, Open Innovation, Social Innovation

An article about the groundbreaking ALS Solution and the huge impact it will have on the drug development for multiple sclerosis. InnoCentive is recognized as the platform for running the Challenge.

Community Foundation to fund problem-solving challenge

DATE: 01/29/2011

TAGS: Crowdsourcing, Government, Making the Business Case, Open Innovation, Social Innovation

An article about the InnoCentive Creating a Community of Successful Readers, posted by the Community Foundation of North Louisiana. The Challenge is the first in a series of “ideas competition” to elicit ideas idea for solving an annually chosen problem affecting the community.

Have a Business Problem? Just Skip It

DATE: 01/20/2011

TAGS: Corporation, Crowdsourcing

An excerpt from Burrus’s new book Flash Foresight, in which he recommends that one business strategy to deal with a huge problem could be to “just to skip it altogether.” He examines the genesis of InnoCentive to explain his position.

Funding: Researching outside the box

DATE: 01/19/2011

TAGS: Corporation, Crowdsourcing, Making the Business Case

An article about the merits of being an InnoCentive Solver.

Toyota taps InnoCentive

DATE: 12/03/2010

TAGS: Corporation, Crowdsourcing, Innovation, Making the Business Case, Open Innovation

This article describes the Toyota-InnoCentive relationship, explaining that InnoCentive's problem-solving methodology is the reason why Toyota turned to us for evaluating and vetting all the Challenge submissions.

On Enlightened Amateurism

DATE: 11/17/2010

TAGS: Crowdsourcing, Making the Business Case, Open Innovation

The writer talks about InnoCentive to highlight the importance of amateur enthusiasts: how innovative answers come from people whose area of expertise is outside of the Challenge domain.

After BP oil spill, thousands of ideas poured in for cleanup

DATE: 11/15/2010

TAGS: Best Practice, Corporation, Crowdsourcing, Making the Business Case, Open Innovation

An article about the solutions BP received to help cleanup the oil spill. BP feel that many of the solutions were good and helped create incremental changes to the existing methods to cleanup the spill. However, many, including InnoCentive CEO Dwayne Spradlin feel that there are more tools that can be used to help propel new innovations and inventions.

Toyota Turns to Consumers for ‘Ideas’

DATE: 11/08/2010

TAGS: Corporation, Crowdsourcing, Government, Innovation, Making the Business Case, Open Innovation, Social Innovation

An article about Toyota's “Ideas for good” campaign, which invites consumers to come up with new ways to use five existing Toyota Motor technologies. InnoCentive worked as a consultant with them on the design of the contest.

Is Breakthrough Innovation In Next Year’s Budget?

DATE: 10/26/2010

TAGS: Best Practice, Corporation, Crowdsourcing, Government, Innovation, Making the Business Case, Not for Profit, Open Innovation

CEO Dwayne Spradlin wrote this article for the Frost & Sullivan eNewsletter. The article is about the importance of optimizing innovation, and the need to plan the budget now, vs. waiting until 2011 has begun and it’s likely to be too late.

Governments looking for innovations in products, services and processes

DATE: 10/07/2010

TAGS: Corporation, Crowdsourcing, Government, Making the Business Case, Open Innovation

The writer, Michael Keating, talks to Jon Fredrickson about how the government can use open innovation and offers some examples in finding out-of-the-box solutions.

Harvard casts a wide net for aid on diabetes

DATE: 10/04/2010

TAGS: Corporation, Crowdsourcing, Not for Profit, Open Innovation, Social Innovation

An article describing the Catalyst Challenge, Solver Kevin Dolan’s solution and the power of crowdsourcing.

Open innovation changes the playing field

DATE: 10/01/2010

TAGS: Corporation, Crowdsourcing, Making the Business Case

CEO Dwayne Spradlin writes about how changing the way the Oil & Gas industry innovates will allow “tools and knowledge from many disciplines to bring about more rapid technology advances.”

‘The Challenge’ Seeks Diabetes Cure

DATE: 09/30/2010

TAGS: Crowdsourcing, Innovation, Making the Business Case, Open Innovation, Social Innovation

An article about the success of finding ideas to the Catalyst Challenge. This article focuses on the motivations for posting it on InnoCentive – to test whether this “crowdsourcing strategy” could be applied to the academic health care community. 9/29/2010

Challenge of finding a cure

DATE: 09/29/2010

TAGS: Crowdsourcing, Innovation, Making the Business Case, Open Innovation, Social Innovation

An article about the origins of the Catalyst Challenge, the crowdsourcing experiment with InnoCentive (which they call the “Challenge”) and the twelve “pioneering” solutions and their Solvers.

"If you Want an Answer, ask Everyone:" The Rise of Crowd-Source Grantmaking

DATE: 09/28/2010

TAGS: Crowdsourcing, Not for Profit, Social Innovation

An article that encourages NFP Foundations to use crowdsourcing as an integral part of their social media strategy, as it can help find new ideas and opportunities. The Rockefeller Foundation, Global Giving and InnoCentive partnership is profiled as a good example for using crowdsourcing solutions to five Challenges, that were themselves identified through crowdsourcing!

'Wisdom of crowds' marshaled to solve type 1 diabetes

DATE: 09/28/2010

TAGS: Crowdsourcing, Innovation, Making the Business Case, Social Innovation

An article profiling Solver Kevin Dolan, one of the winners of the Catalyst Challenge.

Business Ideas from the Crowd

DATE: 09/24/2010

TAGS: Corporation, Crowdsourcing, Making the Business Case

An article encouraging businesses to utilize crowdsourcing based on 7 guidelines. InnoCentive is described as a way to "Engage the solution provider.”

Acclaim calls for UBC doctor's plan to use cellphones to teach

DATE: 09/10/2010

TAGS: Crowdsourcing, Not for Profit, Social Innovation

An article about the winner of The Economist-InnoCentive Challenge on 21st Century Cyber Schools winner, Dr. Andrew Deonarine, and his solution, the EduCell.

UBC medical student wins $10,000 for cellphone based educational system

DATE: 09/09/2010

TAGS: Crowdsourcing, Innovation, Not for Profit, ROI, Social Innovation

A short story about the winner of the first Economist Challenge (Challenge on 21st Century Cyber Schools), Dr. Andrew Deonarine, and his solution, the EduCell plan.)

HuffPost Innovators: InnoCentive, Waste Farmers And More

DATE: 07/22/2010

TAGS: Crowdsourcing, Open Innovation

InnoCentive is featured in Huffington Post's Innovators Series, a compilation of interesting and promising start-ups from the HuffPost community.

A Web-based model for procurement contests

DATE: 07/21/2010

TAGS: Crowdsourcing, Government, Making the Business Case, Open Innovation

A blog post describing InnoCentive and recommending us as a cost-effective option that government agencies should be considering. He references one of the NASA Challenges and briefly explains why InnoCentive is a great option for R&D procurement.

Who gets the credit for the BP container cap? YOU do.

DATE: 07/20/2010

TAGS: Crowdsourcing, Government, Making the Business Case, Open Innovation, Social Innovation

A guest post by Darlene Cavalier, co-founder of ScienceCheerleader.com for the Discover Magazine blog, recommending that the government formalize a process to solicit and vet solutions from the public in light of the overwhelming response to the oil spill clean-up. She includes CEO Dwayne Spradlin as part of a think-tank to help pre-wire the system before the next crisis, suggests that InnoCentive should be an option to solicit & process ideas.

NASA Announces Space Invention Awards

DATE: 07/14/2010

TAGS: Crowdsourcing, Government, Open Innovation

An article describing the NASA Challenges and their winners and solutions.

Oil and the entrepreneur

DATE: 07/11/2010

TAGS: Corporation, Crowdsourcing, Open Innovation, Social Innovation

A write-up about the frustration felt by solution contributors that BP was not listening. It includes a passage about BP’s letter to InnoCentive asking for help finding ways to detect and skim oil.

UK mulls science cash prizes for innovation

DATE: 07/07/2010

TAGS: Crowdsourcing, Government, Making the Business Case, Open Innovation

An article about the UK government considering using cash prize-based competition for discovering new technologies as a cost-effective way to support their R&D. InnoCentive is mentioned as a successful commercial example of using this method in their online marketplace.

NASA Announces Winners of Space Life Sciences Open Innovation Competition

DATE: 07/07/2010

TAGS: Crowdsourcing, Government, Making the Business Case, Open Innovation

NASA's press release announcing the three winning Challenges, the InnoCentive Solvers and their solutions. It also mentions how these Challenges (plus one upcoming one), and by extension InnoCentive, are part of their overall innovation strategy.

Should we trust the wisdom of crowds?

DATE: 07/05/2010

TAGS: Best Practice, Crowdsourcing, Making the Business Case, Open Innovation

An opinion piece about the pitfalls of crowdsourcing. InnoCentive is mentioned by Geoff Mulgan in a side box of the article, as a company who uses “crowdsourcing extensively.

Possible oil-spill solutions pour in, seemingly unheeded, from around the world

DATE: 07/03/2010

TAGS: Best Practice, Corporation, Crowdsourcing, Open Innovation, Social Innovation

An article describing some of the oil-spill solutions that were sent to BP, some of the difficulties they face in sorting through the ideas and the frustration felt by everyone that their ideas were not looked at, including InnoCentive’s submissions.

Opinion: Innocentive and 80,000 people try to help with spill. Result, zip.

DATE: 07/01/2010

TAGS: Crowdsourcing, Open Innovation, Social Innovation

An opinion piece about BP’s inaction, referencing CEO Dwayne Spradlin’s blog post "InnoCentive Oil Spill Challenge - BP’s Response."

Tapping the crowd for technologies

DATE: 07/01/2010

TAGS: Crowdsourcing, Open Innovation

This article by Nature highlights InnoCentive’s role in Open Innovation and crowdsourcing and our efforts to help with the gulf oil spill.

BP Snubs Innovators: Today's Outrage

DATE: 06/25/2010

TAGS: Crowdsourcing, Open Innovation, Social Innovation

An opinion piece on the outrage following BP’s refusal of the 908 ideas submitted by InnoCentive’s Solvers, and InnoCentive’s next steps in trying to help clean the oil spill.

BP to InnoCentive: Sorry, We Don't Want Your 908 Ideas for Saving the Gulf

DATE: 06/23/2010

TAGS: Crowdsourcing, Making the Business Case, Social Innovation

An article about BP refusing to work with InnoCentive and accept the free 908 ideas for cleaning up the oil spill. Includes quotes from CEO Dwayne Spradlin.

The Rise Of The Collaboration Backbone

DATE: 06/22/2010

TAGS: Corporation, Crowdsourcing, Innovation, Open Innovation

An article about the importance and pervasiveness of collaboration technologies, citing InnoCentive as an example.

Does Crowdsourcing Threaten your Job (Or Offer New Opportunity?)

DATE: 06/16/2010

TAGS: Corporation, Crowdsourcing, Innovation, Making the Business Case, Open Innovation

An article about the evolution of crowdsourcing and its potential to be a threat or an opportunity for experts. InnoCentive is mentioned as an example of a crowdsourcing platform that coordinates expert crowds to work on tasks requiring specialized knowledge.

A Gusher of Oil Spill Solutions

DATE: 06/15/2010

TAGS: Crowdsourcing, Making the Business Case, Open Innovation, Social Innovation

A blog post on Fox News's blog Live Shots that includes interview with Dwayne Spradlin about the oil spill cleanup challenge.

How to stop the spill

DATE: 06/02/2010

TAGS: Corporation, Crowdsourcing, Government, Making the Business Case, Not for Profit, Open Innovation, Social Innovation

Chris Mathew's from NBC's "Hardball with Chris Matthews" interviews InnoCentive CEO Dwayne Spradlin about the oil spill Challenge. They discuss the variety of the solutions submitted by our Solvers and the underlying need for those in charge to start looking very seriously at the some of the solutions to clean up the oil spill.

Got an idea to clean up the oil spill?

DATE: 05/24/2010

TAGS: Crowdsourcing, Innovation, Making the Business Case, Not for Profit, Open Innovation

An interview with CEO Dwayne Spradlin about how InnoCentive Solvers have taken up the challenge to solve the oil spill problem and and a brief discussion of the "what’s next” step.

Inventors say BP Ignoring Their Oil Spill Ideas

DATE: 05/19/2010

TAGS: Corporation, Crowdsourcing, Innovation, Making the Business Case, Open Innovation

An article by Michael Kunzelman and Mike Baker commenting on BP's failure to use the ideas submitted to help in cleaning up the oil spill. It references the many ideas submitted to InnoCentive's Emergency 2.0 Oil Spill Challenge.

BP May Be Letting Best Solutions Slip By

DATE: 05/18/2010

TAGS: Corporation, Crowdsourcing, Making the Business Case, Open Innovation

An article by Carmen Nobel that lists different ways BP is letting solutions slip through the cracks. It includes a brief description of InnoCentive's oil spill challenge and the variety of viable solutions submitted.

Solve world education problems and win $10k

DATE: 05/12/2010

TAGS: Crowdsourcing, Making the Business Case, Not for Profit, Open Innovation, Social Innovation

An article encouraging people to register on InnoCentive and submit ideas to the InnoCentive-Economist Challenge "The 21st Century Cyber-schools Challenge."

NPR’s Talk of the Nation: Science Friday

DATE: 05/07/2010

TAGS: Crowdsourcing, Innovation, Making the Business Case, Open Innovation, Social Innovation

Ira Flatow, host of NPR’s “Talk of the Nation: Science Friday” discusses some “outside-the-box” solutions for stopping the oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico with three guest panelists, including InnoCentive CEO Dwayne Spradlin. Dwayne shared some interesting and innovative solutions to InnoCentive’s Emergency Response 2.0 Challenge, Solutions to Respond to Oil Spill in the Gulf of Mexico.

The Collective Intelligence Genome

DATE: 03/31/2010

TAGS: Crowdsourcing, Making the Business Case, Open Innovation

This is a PDF of an article written in MIT Sloan Management Review's Spring 2010 edition about three collaborative innovators: InnoCentive Threadless and Wikipedia.

Innovation and the economy in 2010

DATE: 12/17/2009

TAGS: Corporation, Crowdsourcing, Government, Innovation, Making the Business Case, Not for Profit, Open Innovation, Social Innovation

This is a 50-minute video segment of a panel discussion that CEO Dwayne Spradlin participated in as part of the Economist’s The World in 2010 event in Washington D.C. He offers his insight into the future of innovation discusses the state of the economy, economic and business innovation, and opportunities for growth.

Innovation in a Recession

DATE: 09/25/2009

TAGS: Corporation, Crowdsourcing, Government, Innovation, Making the Business Case, Not for Profit, Open Innovation

CTO David Ritter is included in KQED Radio’s “Forum with Michael Krasny” to discuss how some companies are leveraging new technology to foster innovation in a down economy.

Crowdsourcing for Small Businesses

DATE: 08/11/2009

TAGS: Crowdsourcing, Making the Business Case

InnoCentive is featured in article as a company whose services not only benefit large companies with large R&D budgets but smaller companies as well with tighter budgets and more specific needs.

In Search of Innovation

DATE: 06/22/2009

TAGS: Crowdsourcing, Making the Business Case, Open Innovation

This is an article on Innovation that highlights InnoCentive as a marketplace of ideas.

Daily Planet: May 27, 2009 - Clip 4

DATE: 05/27/2009

TAGS: Crowdsourcing, Not for Profit

This is a live 12-minute segment on Discovery Channel Canada's Daily Planet covering InnoCentive with CEO Dwayne Spradlin and Top Solver Tom Kruer. The interview focuses on invention and various creations that aim to solve real-world problems.

The Next Wave of Open Innovation

DATE: 04/08/2009

TAGS: Crowdsourcing, Open Innovation

This article is a profile of InnoCentive, it’s growth and the future of the company. It describes our technology and networking capabilities to connect problems with their potential solvers.

Using Social Media and Crowd-Sourcing for Quick and Simple Market Research

DATE: 01/27/2009

TAGS: Crowdsourcing

InnoCentive is mentioned as the most well-known example of crowdsourcing to solve R&D problems for corporations.

Crowdsourcing Innovation: Q&A with Dwayne Spradlin of InnoCentive

DATE: 12/15/2008

TAGS: Crowdsourcing, Not for Profit, Open Innovation

This is an interview with InnoCentive CEO Dwayne Spradlin about why crowdsourcing is becoming a powerful tool for doing good.

Thinkers Putting Creative Caps On For Cash

DATE: 11/06/2008

TAGS: Crowdsourcing, Government

InnoCentive is featured as a prize-based and crowdsourcing site. It mentions the Solver John Davis and the Seeker Chicagoland Chamber of Commerce.

Crowdsourcing with Jeff Howe

DATE: 08/26/2008

TAGS: Corporation, Crowdsourcing, Innovation, Making the Business Case, Not for Profit, Open Innovation, Social Innovation

John Dankosky, host of NPR’s podcast “Where We Live” talks to Wired journalist Jeff Howe, author of "Crowdsourcing: Why the Power of the Crowd Is Driving the Future of Business." This episode, titled Crowdsourcing, discusses how crowdsourcing works and how it can also be applied to solve social problems. They profile companies that innovate through crowdsourcing, citing InnoCentive as its largest commercial example. Dwayne Spradlin is one of the guest speakers.