Perspectives on Innovation

Liz Moise:
I’m joined by Ray Umashankar, Executive Director of the ASSET India Foundation. ASSET India is a non-profit organization that provides computer literacy programs to marginalized children in India so they will have the skills and knowledge needed to escape the sex trade industry in India. ASSET India recently posted a Challenge on InnoCentive seeking the solution of a solar-powered wireless router so they could bring their services to rural parts of India. The Challenge was recently solved by Solver, Zacary Brown. We’ll be putting out the announcement in the next few weeks. Ray, Can you describe the challenges that marginalized Indian children face and how your organization is working to alleviate them?

Ray Umashankar:
Liz, all the new found wealth generated by India’s prominence as a global IT power has not trickled down to the people at the bottom of the pyramid. Life at the bottom of the pyramid has become even more difficult with rising food and fuel costs.

Working with nonprofits to help abused women and children get back on their feet, our daughter Nita was stunned to discover the hopelessness of the children of sex workers. She knew she would see dire poverty in India, but these children seemed to be the most disenfranchised of all: even the poorest of the poor ostracized them. The fear of HIV/AIDS made it worse.

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I recently interviewed Scott Pegau, Director of the Oil Spill Recover Institute (OSRI) in Cordova Alaska. OSRI was created by the government in response to the Exxon Valdez oil spill, and has been tasked with improving oil spill response in Arctic and subarctic marine waters. As you may know, OSRI has posted several Challenges on the InnoCentive website, including the Challenge, recently made famous by the New York Times, to separate oil from water in recovery barges. That Challenge was solved by John Davis, an oil-industry outsider. We find that many of the best solutions on our network come from outside the industry in which they are posted.

Liz Moise:
Scott, tell me – how long had you been working on this particular Challenge before coming to InnoCentive, and what other avenues did you pursue before coming to us for help with this problem?

Scott Pegau:
Actually, the process of setting up a prize program predates my arrival at OSRI.  The idea had been kicked around for a couple years, but hadn’t fully developed because of the need to ensure the program was properly run and advertised.  Once InnoCentive was identified as a mechanism to post and manage challenges we started to actually draft the concepts that have become the challenges we have released.

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With the American political season in high gear, what, if any contribution do you think open innovation can make to the policies of the next administration?

John McCain has proposed a $300 million prize for the development of a better car battery as part of his energy policy. Barack Obama spoke with ScienceDebate2008 about his technology and science innovation plan in an interview just published on the Wired Blog today.

Do you think open innovation or prize-based innovation would work on a government level? If you could suggest an issue or problem that could be solved with open innovation to either candidate, what would it be?

WNPR will interview Jeff Howe, and Dwayne Spradlin at 9am EST on their live show “Where We Live” tomorrow, Tuesday August 26th. The topic is Crowdsourcing, what it means, and how people are currently taking advantage of the opportunities it brings. I thought it would be great to hear from you, as most of you represent “the crowd” in this metaphor, and have unique perspectives on what it means to you. When does it work, when does it fail? Please share your thoughts - before, during, and after the show airs by adding comments below. I will be monitoring and contributing to the discussion as well.

What:
WNPR: Where We Live: Crowdsourcing - 8.26.08

Listen In Online:
You can hear the show, streaming live online on WNPR.org
If you live in the WNPR area (CT, RI, NY) you can listen to it live on your local WNPR station

When:
Tuesday, August 26th, 9am EST

Chris Brogan’s post (Solve Some Real World Problems) this morning really caught my attention. It’s a call to action for startups and individuals alike to rethink how they might use their businesses or positions to help solve real problems in the world. As Solvers at InnoCentive I know you are motivated by the chance to really impact the world, not just the chance to earn money. InnoCentive’s philanthropic endeavors, and the amazing potential this business has to enable individuals to contribute to solving the world’s most important Challenges was a large part of my motivation when I took this job as the marketing manager and social media evangelist. This year you have helped bringing solar powered light to Africa through SunightSolar, helped innovate ways to clean up remaining oil in Alaska for OSRI, and are currently sending in your research results on how to help detect a biomarker for ALS/Lou Gehrig’s Disease.

I had an interesting conversation with Michael Anuzis yesterday about ways to continue to improve the depth of opportunity that InnoCentive offers to contributers who want to make a difference in the world. He is one of many individuals who have blogged, called, emailed or dm’d me recently with ideas for growing our business. It’s pretty inspiring to see how strongly people believe in the concept of InnoCentive. He suggested that we find a way to allow individuals to contribute small amounts of money towards innovation projects they see on InnoCentive.com. Much like the contribution model of our friends at Global Giving. I suggested that perhaps we could even allow individuals to post an idea for a Challenge that they feel strongly about, and then use the website as a way to gather financial support around it. Once the support has hit a certain level, they would be allowed to post the Challenge and ask for solutions. These are just initial ideas, and I know you have more - please share them with us! As we grow the business, especially the philanthropic side of the business, we want to hear your thoughts.