What Have You Done With Your InnoCentive Prize Winnings?
A few weeks ago, InnoCentive Solver Ed Herrmann Tweeted the following: “Just deposited my Innocentive check for the Polestar Challenge. Now I just need to decide what to buy; suggestions?” He received a few responses, including an enthusiastic suggestion to sponsor a happy hour in Phoenix. In the end, he used the money to purchase a new server and an SDN Subscription. He’s planning to use the server to run the SAP Web Application Server which comes with the subscription, which will provide him with his own licensed SAP system to use for future SAP related InnoCentive Challenges.
Over the years, we’ve heard about Solvers using their winnings for all manner of things – from philanthropy to upgrading lab equipment to upgrading home entertainment equipment. John Davis, winner of the OSRI oil spill Challenge is planning to use his winnings to fund a trip to Alaska, to help the Seeker, the Oil Spill Recovery Institute, develop and implement his solution. In addition, he donated some of his winnings to OSRI to be used toward finding more environmentally friendly methods of cleaning up oil spills.
What about you? What have you done with your winnings? If you haven’t yet won an award, what do you think you would do? Tell us!
Tags: InnoCentive awards, oil spill, OSRI, prizes, SAP
July 11th, 2009 at 9:10 am
If I win any InnoCentive prize, I’ll send the IRS their cut, then apply the balance towards converting my Provisional Patent Applications to regular patent applications. In addition to the mechanism for maximizing plant growth, which I described in an InnoCentive challenge response, I have Provisional Patent Applications outstanding on a radical new type of razor blade, and on a diesel-type steam engine. Origo
July 13th, 2009 at 10:41 pm
I never won any award and probably will never win in the future due to my limiting abilities but I still have a flame in me for creating and perhaps along the way by contributing some ideas, very gifted people reading my communications may pick up somethings from me where they can perhaps achieve very great strides in development for many.
July 14th, 2009 at 5:14 pm
Well, so far I submited only one solution (and that just partly because some indispensable data were missing), but I think I would win that challenge for sure. Since I am inventor, I need lot of money just to have >>state of Art<>Virtuall Prototyping<< software to build and test my inventions on computer. Beside this, I am retired for health reasons and my pension is small, and moreover saddled with some long range credits and a mortgage that I have to pay. So I would try to get rid of my debt first of all after buying new computer(s), and then finance patenting my inventions that produce extremely cheap electricity. Cheap energy would lower prices of all products, make use of fossile fuels unnecesary so their price would drop also, and whole world would be able to buy more products, so production would rise and with it employment, and so on…… I wish I have ways to contact Rockefeller Foundation or somebody else who can invest in cheap energy production, but those people like Mr. Gates dont even answer that mail was received, so somebody has to recomend me. Then, future of World would not depend on my winning a chalenge, and my invention would help with Global Warming process also, feeding about bilion chronicaly hungry and periodicaly starving people.
July 29th, 2009 at 2:47 pm
After I splurged a little and bought myself a new road bicycle, I donated a lot of my challenge winnings to a number of non-profit organizations that do good things around the world. For example, I have contributed a big chunk of winnings toward helping prototype the inexpensive, brick making machine that was one of the challenges that I was lucky enough to win.