WHAT IS A CHALLENGE PRIZE?
Challenge prizes offer a reward to whoever can first or most effectively meet a defined challenge. Through a public competition, challenge prizes aim to tap into and engage the broadest possible community of innovators to solve a specific problem or challenge. Rather than specifying what a solution must look like, challenge prizes set out a clearly defined goal, along with information on how success will be measured and invite innovators to propose how they think it could be solved. This approach allows for a wide range of solutions to be considered.
They are particularly suited to solving problems that share some key characteristics:
- Problems that are defined well enough so that a clear goal for innovators can be set.
- Problems that would benefit from the fresh thinking that comes from new innovators; for instance, because the field is stagnant, has few players, or there is a related field that is much more dynamic.
- Problems where a prize could attract new innovators to address them, within a reasonable budget and timescale.
- Problems where the additional funding and attention of the prize could address market failures, galvanise action and accelerate progress.
- Problems where the solution could thrive in the market (or find continued funding) after the prize is awarded.