Why should I sponsor a competition?

It is expensive and high-risk for a company to rely on finding a solution internally via R&D projects. It is expensive and time-consuming for a government or NGO to engage the public in order to refocus attention and effort. Sponsors of competitions have realized that giving out a prize can be a cost-effective way to find innovative solutions or engage innovators and that a properly run competition can save time and lower internal risks.

 

In addition, competitions are increasingly being seen as a tool that can:

  • Create Patents: "Evidence suggests that the prizes led to significant improvements in the quality of technological invention." - Professor Josh Lerner, Harvard Business School
  • Find Outside Innovation: "Successfully operated competitions get up to 30% of entrants from outside the competition's field" - Prizecapital.net
  • Elevate Ideas: "Prizes highlight and elevate superlative behaviors, ideas, and achievements in order to motivate, guide, and inspire others" - McKinsey report 2009
  • Save money: "[Prizes and Challenges] stimulate private sector investment that is many times greater than the cash value of the prize;" (White House, Guidance on the Use of Challenges and Prizes to Promote Open Government, 2010)
  • Require less effort to participate: 'It is much easier to enter a competition for a company than submit a government procurement application' Bev Godwin, US General Services Administration, August 2010
  • Provide better solutions: 'Prizes can solve a given problem with many different approaches and not with a pre-determined solution' Aneesh Chopra, Chief Technology Officer of the US (White House), August 2010 

Giving out prizes is an increasingly widely utilized method of finding solutions.

We look forward to continued growth in prize use and further evolution of best practices. We anticipate the continued development of a global "prize industry" that will professionalize the management and support of prizes and make prizes more accessible to organizations with relatively small resources.
  • Businesses, charities, governments and non-governmental organizations give prizes as inducements for a variety of reasons. These range from the desire to bring about societal change to the desire to buy the best innovation to add to a company's current offering.
  • As it is well known that real change comes from individuals, SMEs, and entrepreneurs who are acting outside the walls of bureaucratic entities, there is a need to find these innovators and visionaries and to engage with them.
  • There are a growing number of clients who understand the utility of reaching this audience via prizes. That is because prizes and competitions are not only a cost-effective tool for reaching the desired audience and probing for solutions but also a unique opportunity for positioning and messaging.
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