A Chance to Win $ 25,000 in the Habitat for Humanity Challenge from InnoCentive

InnoCentive announced the Habitat for Humanity Challenge: Increasing Resilience to Earthquakes and Typhoons for Homes with No Foundations. Tens, or perhaps hundreds, of millions of people in low-income areas throughout the world, live in homes that do not have an adequate foundation. This puts the people and their home at extreme risk in the event of a natural disaster such as an earthquake or typhoon. 

Habitat for Humanity, supported by SeaFreight Labs, is seeking innovative, cost-effective methods to retrofit such houses to make the structure stronger to enable them to survive high magnitude earthquakes and typhoon force winds. Innovation in this area could potentially improve the lives and safety of countless people around the globe. This is a Reduction-to-Practice Challenge that requires written documentation and proof-of-concept demonstration data if available.

Innovation in this area could potentially help tens, if not hundreds, of millions of people worldwide, live in a safer, more durable housing. While the primary focus of this Challenge is on retrofitting existing structures there is also a need to develop less expensive methods for adding foundations during the initial construction phase and ideal solutions would encompass both aspects of adding foundations to low-income housing.

Submission Requirements:

The submission to the Challenge should include the following:

• A detailed description of the proposed Solution addressing specific Technical Requirements presented in the Detailed Description of the Challenge. This description should be accompanied by a well-articulated rationale supported by literature and/or patent precedents if available.
• Proof-of-concept demonstration data, if available, as outlined in the Detailed Description of the Challenge.  

To receive an award, Solvers will not have to transfer their exclusive Intellectual Property (IP) rights to the Seeker. Instead, Solvers will grant Habitat for Humanity a non-exclusive license to practice their solutions and the right to share awarded solutions with other nonprofit organizations worldwide. Habitat for Humanity will make awarded solutions freely available to other nonprofit organizations to help improve the state of low-income housing worldwide.

Prize:

The winner of this challenge will receive prize money of $ 25,000.

Eligibility:

Employees and interns of Habitat for Humanity International (HFHI), as well as their immediate family members (spouse, parent, child, sibling, and their respective spouses) or persons living in the same household, whether related or not, are eligible to enter the Challenge; provided that they will not be eligible to receive an award if their Solution is chosen.  In addition, the Solutions of employees and interns of HFHI will fall under HFHI’s employment policies and be considered work product of HFHI. Please note, employees and interns of Habitat for Humanity Affiliates and independent National Organizations are eligible to enter and receive an award if their Solution is chosen.

Evaluation Criteria:

The Challenge award is contingent upon theoretical evaluation and field demonstration or validation of the submitted Solutions by the Seeker. Note that due to the need to field test potential solutions the evaluation period for this Challenge has been extended to 120 days.

About InnoCentive:

InnoCentive is the global innovation marketplace where creative minds solve some of the world's most important problems for cash awards up to $1 million. Commercial, governmental and humanitarian organizations engage with InnoCentive to solve problems that can impact humankind in areas ranging from the environment to medical advancements. An InnoCentive Ideation™ Challenge is a broad question formulated to obtain access to new ideas, similar to a global brainstorm for producing a breakthrough idea or market survey which may include ideas for a new product line, a new commercial application for a current product, or even a viral marketing idea to recruit new customers.

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