Need

The brown tree snake (Boiga irregularis) is not native to Guam. It arrived as a post-World War II stowaway, almost certainly in military or commercial cargo from the New Guinea region, and was first observed on the island in the early 1950s. Within two decades it had spread island-wide, exploiting an absence of natural predators and an abundance of prey.

The consequences have been catastrophic and largely irreversible:

• 9 of 11 native forest bird species have been driven to extinction on Guam: among the worst avian losses attributable to a single invasive species anywhere in the world.
• Native lizard populations have collapsed, and bat and broader vertebrate communities have been severely disrupted.
• Ecosystem functions (seed dispersal, pollination, forest regeneration) have been fundamentally degraded.
• More than 1,600 snake-caused electrical outages were recorded in a single 20-year period beginning in 1978. Power disruptions continue island-wide to this day, costing an estimated $4-4.5 million USD per year in infrastructure damage, business losses, and productivity.
• Brown tree snakes pose ongoing public-health risks, including medically significant bites (particularly to infants and children) and frequent household intrusions.
• Military readiness and regional biosecurity are at persistent risk. The threat of spread to Hawaii and the Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands (CNMI) is active and credible.

Despite 70+ years of effort by USDA, USGS, U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, and DoD, no scalable, integrated solution exists. Trapping, detector dogs, acetaminophen bait drops, and port interdiction each address parts of the problem but remain labor-intensive, fragmented, and insufficient at island-wide scale. The total annual burden when prevention programs, military readiness, and ecological irreversibility are factored in far exceeds the documented power-outage cost alone.

Without new technology, island-wide eradication is widely-considered nearly impossible. This Challenge exists to close the gap between available technology and deployable solutions.

Prize/IP/Rules

Participant Benefits: up to $550,000 in cash prizes, plus potential Other Transaction Authority (OTA) pathways to direct procurement.

See the Terms and Conditions at the foot of https://centralfloridatechgrove.org/autonomous-control-of-invasive-species-challenge/.

Beyond cash prizes, selected solutions may qualify for:

• Other Transaction Authority (OTA) pathways providing direct procurement opportunities with government sponsors
• Pilot and field demonstration opportunities on Guam in partnership with U.S. military and federal agency stakeholders
• Transition pathways toward real-world deployment and procurement at scale

Intellectual Property: Solvers retain all IP rights to their submissions. Submission does not transfer ownership or exclusive rights to the Seeker or sponsors. A non-exclusive, royalty-free license is requested solely for the purposes of Challenge evaluation. Any further licensing or procurement agreements will be negotiated separately at the Solver's discretion.

Note: your applications to this Challenge must not include any information containing Controlled Unclassified Information (CUI).

Submissions to this Challenge must be received by 11:59 PM (US Eastern Time) on August 10th, 2026.

Please review the later Participation Guidance section before submitting a proposal.

- Login or register your interest to start solving! -

Seeker/Eligibility

Organized by: Tech Grove (Orlando, Florida, USA) and the Central Florida Tech Grove innovation network, on behalf of US DoD:

• Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA)
• U.S. Marine Corps Headquarters (HQMC)
• Strategic Environmental Research and Development Program / Environmental Security Technology Certification Program (SERDP/ESTCP)

Who can participate: This Challenge is intentionally broad. No prior experience with brown tree snakes, wildlife management, or Guam is required. Eligible participants include:

• Startups and emerging technology companies
• Universities and research institutions
• Defense contractors and system integrators
• Drone, robotics, and autonomous systems manufacturers
• Sensor and surveillance technology providers
• Environmental technology innovators
• Government laboratories and non-traditional defense innovators
• Multi-organization teams with complementary capabilities
• Independent inventors and individual innovators
• Cross-disciplinary teams formed specifically for this Challenge

Note on regulated tools: Some BTS control methods (notably acetaminophen-based toxicants) are restricted by the U.S. EPA to use by trained government personnel. Submissions proposing regulated interventions must acknowledge the applicable framework and describe a realistic compliance pathway.

Individuals, teams, and organizations are eligible to participate in this Challenge.

See the Terms and Conditions at the foot of https://centralfloridatechgrove.org/autonomous-control-of-invasive-species-challenge/.

Challenge

The brown tree snake population on Guam represents one of the most challenging invasive species threats faced anywhere. Traditional detection, suppression, or eradication methods have achieved only limited success against Guam's dense forest environments and rugged terrain.

This Challenge invites startups, universities, defense contractors, AI and drone teams, robotics developers, sensor engineers, and environmental technology innovators to bring this goal forward where current methods are not yet successful.

The Seeker is seeking novel, deployable, and operationally practical solutions to one or more of the following problem areas:

• Innovative technologies and approaches that lead to the eradication of Guam's invasive Brown Tree Snake population.
• Solutions leveraging artificial intelligence, autonomous systems, robotics, sensors, drones, advanced analytics, environmental technologies, or novel operational concepts.
• Individual or integrated team solutions addressing one or more aspects of the challenge.
• Concepts with the potential to scale across Guam's complex terrain and operational environments.

Known research gaps solvers should consider:

• Standardized snake detection benchmarks are rare, especially for thermal, LiDAR, and radar
• Ectotherm-triggered false-negative rates for off-the-shelf PIR sensors are high
• Trap efficacy is inconsistent across habitat types
• Multi-modal approaches (eDNA + dogs + telemetry + opportunistic capture) show promise but lack integration

Automation architectures exist but have limited field validation in tropical island environments

Solution Requirements

All submissions must address the following criteria:

• Operational Feasibility: The solution must be deployable in Guam's field conditions: tropical climate, variable terrain, and diverse land-use contexts from jungle to military base perimeters to port facilities. It must be operable by trained field personnel who are not engineers.
• Scalability: Solutions should demonstrate a credible pathway to island-wide deployment, not just small-scale pilot performance. Cost per unit area managed, or per snake detected/removed, should be articulated.
• Measurability: Define specific performance metrics and how they will be assessed in the field (e.g., detection sensitivity, false positive/negative rates, area coverage per unit time, cost per outcome).
• Integration Potential: If your solution addresses a single sub-system, explain how it interfaces with upstream or downstream components. Solutions designed with integration in mind are preferred.
• Regulatory Compliance Pathway: Solutions involving regulated agents must describe a realistic pathway to authorized use. Solutions not subject to this constraint should say so explicitly.

Solutions from across the Technology Readiness Level (TRL) scale are invited.

Your Submission

Please login and register your interest, to complete the submission form.

The submitted proposals must be written in English and can include the following sections:

1. Company and Contact Information - about you, your team/business, and relevant contact information
2. Solution Description and Performance - including the makeup, methodology, and potential performance of your approach and how it would be deployed.
3. Collaboration & Networking - whether you might be open to teaming up with other providers, and your preference of being seen as a Prime or Subcontractor candidate
4. Potential References - note: these are not required, but example references and referees for previous, relevant work
5. Key Takeaways and Innovations - the core approach, findings, and potential performance of your application
6. Attachments - any additional information to support your application.

Participation Guidance

1. Submission Close Date: Submissions to this Challenge must be received by 11:59 PM (US Eastern Time) on August 10th, 2026.
2. Late submissions: Late submissions will not be considered.
3. Multiple submissions, 3 Maximum: In case of multiple submissions by the same Solver, only 3 submissions – the final 3 submitted – will be considered. Any other submissions will be deleted prior to evaluation.
4. Submission form and attachments: Your submission will be evaluated by the evaluation team first reviewing the information and content you have submitted at the submission form, with attachments used as additional context to your form submission. Submissions relying solely on attachments will receive less attention from the evaluation team.
5. Evaluation notification steps: After the Challenge submission close date, Wazoku will transmit relevant submissions to Tech Grove, for review by the evaluation team according to the timeline in the Challenge header. Everyone who submits a proposal will be notified about the status of their submissions.
6. Use of AI: Please note that any submissions produced solely with generative AI are not of interest.
7. Learn more: Find out more about participation in Innocentive Challenges

Solvers may want to watch the Ideation Forum recording before developing your submission — it features subject matter experts, field operators, and government stakeholders discussing the operational problem, existing tools, and known gaps:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VpliqfWxKNI

See the Terms and Conditions at the foot of https://centralfloridatechgrove.org/autonomous-control-of-invasive-species-challenge/.