Science magazine Scientific American and InnoCentive, Inc., the global leader in open innovation, crowdsourcing, and prize competitions, have announced a partnership for an online hub that seeks to help science enthusiasts solve global scientific problems. The Scientific American Open Innovation Pavilion, scheduled to go live in the spring of 2013, will be jointly hosted on InnoCentive.com and ScientificAmerican.com.
Commercial organisations, government agencies, and non-profits (known as 'Seekers') will be able to post 'Challenges' on the Scientific American Open Innovation Pavilion. These 'Challenges' are well-articulated descriptions of scientific and technical problems that require innovative solutions. The Scientific American Open Innovation Pavilion provides these 'Seekers' with unprecedented access to a global pool of problem solvers, including InnoCentive's existing 275,000-person-strong solver network and Scientific American's audience of nearly five million monthly visitors to ScientificAmerican.com.
This partnership also marks the growth of InnoCentive's collaboration with Nature Publishing Group (NPG), Scientific American's parent organisation. In June 2009, InnoCentive and NPG launched the nature.com Open Innovation Pavilion, which is hosted on InnoCentive.com and nature.com, www.nature.com/openinnovation.
The Scientific American Open Innovation Pavilion is one of several Scientific American initiatives that center on solving real life science challenges. Since May 2011, the magazine has actively promoted citizen science projects at www.scientificamerican.com/citizen-science. In 2012, Scientific American launched the Science in Action Award, powered by the Google Science Fair, which recognises a project by young scientists that addresses a social, environmental or health issue to make a practical difference in the lives of a community.
