Perspectives on Innovation

The vast majority of Challenges posted by InnoCentive Seekers are of such a confidential nature that we are never permitted to reveal even the Seeker’s identity, much less the actual solution.  However, we recently announced that the SunNight Solar Challenge, which was seeking a solar powered mosquito repellant to combat malaria had been awarded.  We are very fortunate in this instance, that the Seeker, SunNight Solar, and the Solver, Tom Kruer, have been willing to talk about the winning solution.  Below is an overview of the solution, provided by Solver Tom Kruer.

This blog entry describes, in detail the winning entry for the InnoCentive Challenge entitled “Reducing Risk of Malaria with Solar Powered Device”. The simple, passive solar device is shown in the illustration at left.

Not surprisingly, coming up with a viable solution to this Challenge involved the typical phases of product development project. Research uncovered the relatively few critical features that the product absolutely needed to have in order to be successful. The design phase generated and evaluated a number of alternative approaches which incorporated these critical features.  Two of these designs broke all the rules (including the ultimate solution) which the Seeker agreed to at least look at. A couple of crude functional prototypes were constructed to prove that the concept was feasible.  After that, it just was time to crunch some cost estimates and write up the submission for InnoCentive.

It must be pointed out that the Rockefeller Foundation and SunNight Solar deserve a great deal of praise for agreeing to publish this information and achieve as wide an audience as possible… with the ultimate hope of eradicating this terrible disease.  (more…)

We recently announced that a Challenge seeking the design of an affordable solar-powered device to prevent or limit the spread of malaria had been solved.  The Challenge was posted by Mark Bent, CEO of SunNight Solar.  Mark has been in the InnoCentive spotlight before, having previously posted a Challenge to create a solar powered light source for people living in off-grid areas of the world.

Mark’s interest in eradicating malaria comes from his own personal experience, and from his ongoing desire to help the world’s most vulnerable populations.  I asked Mark to provide some thoughts on the background of this Challenge, which he has kindly done in the post below.  Next week we’ll hear from the Solver of this Challenge, Tom Kruer.

Innocentive and SunNight Solar have recently announced the results of our latest cooperative effort – development of a device to trap and kill the mosquito which is the vector for malaria. With 300-500 million cases of malaria each year, resulting in immense societal and economic costs, over a million deaths and a child in Africa dying every 30 seconds from this disease, this is an effort SunNight Solar is very pleased to push forward to the product testing and commercialization stage. Our thanks to Innocentive, as well as funding from the Rockefeller Foundation, which has made this all possible.

I also wanted to offer some insights and developments which surprised me, and once again, showed another value proposition in participating in the Innocentive platform and this unique development cycle. I lived in Africa for over two decades and have contracted malaria twice, so I have some idea of the impact this malady has on the human body. I have also had friends die and I have seen the full hospital wards, so I have some first hand knowledge of malaria. Regrettably, with global warming, the range of mosquito infestation will no doubt grow and more people will be impacted by this disease in the future, so finding new ways to attack this age old problem is essential. (more…)