Our guide to challenge prizes
Our guide to challenge prizes shows how we incentivise the world’s brightest minds to solve pressing problems
Challenge prizes are a powerful tool for unlocking breakthrough innovation. By offering a reward to whoever can solve a problem first or most effectively, they incentivise the world’s brightest minds to tackle pressing issues.
However, a successful challenge prize requires more than just offering a cash reward. Challenge prizes work best when they are carefully constructed to attract the right talent, provide robust support, and ensure that radical ideas evolve into real-world solutions.
What you’ll discover in the guide: Drawing on the insights of our skilled team – the architects and managers of over 100 challenge prizes – A Guide to Challenge Prizes shares our proven methodology for designing and running high-impact competitions. We unpack the critical questions you need to ask to maximise your prize’s impact, exploring:
Identifying the right problems: Which challenges benefit most from fresh thinking and new perspectives? Challenge prizes thrive where the goal can be clearly articulated, but the best solutions or sources of innovation are uncertain.
Designing for disruption: How do you balance ambitious goals with the targeted financial and expert support innovators need to succeed?
Transforming markets: How can a prize not just solve a single problem, but disrupt the status quo, support scaling, and create entirely new markets rather than relying on a single bet?
Let’s solve this together Whether you represent a government, a commercial enterprise, or a philanthropic funder, this guide will help you turn seemingly impossible challenges into pipelines of new approaches.
Download a copy of A Guide to Challenge Prizes 2026 or read it below.
Our work
Over 100 challenge prizes delivered
Since our foundation in 2012, we have worked with government, commercial, and philanthropic funders around the world to run over 100 successful challenge prizes.
Over £294 million awarded
We have distributed over £294M to innovators, launching major initiatives like the £7.5 million Longitude Prize on ALS and running prizes that have given rise to monumental real-world impacts.
A multidisciplinary team of 40+ experts
Our team of over 40 professionals combines deep expertise in design, innovation, programme and financial management, research, evaluation, and communications.
FAQs
Still keen to understand more about challenge prizes? Take a look through our FAQs for answers to some of the most common questions we receive.
What kind of problems work well as the basis for a challenge prize?
Challenge prizes work best when you have a clear, well-defined problem, but the optimal solution – and who might create it – remains uncertain. They are ideal for stubborn issues that require fresh thinking, new perspectives, and a disruption of the status quo.
How does a challenge prize differ from traditional grant funding?
Instead of placing a single upfront bet on an untested proposal, challenge prizes reward actual success. They incentivise action by offering a prize for solutions that have been proven to work, creating a diverse pipeline of potential innovations in a highly cost-effective way.
What benefits do innovators get beyond the final cash prize?
The value of a challenge prize extends far beyond the winner’s cheque. Throughout the competition, innovators receive targeted expert support to build capacity and develop skills. Reaching the finalist stages also brings crucial credibility and publicity, helping teams attract subsequent investment and lasting partnerships.
Can challenge prizes drive change beyond just the winning solution?
Yes, well-designed challenge prizes are powerful tools for systemic change. Beyond solving a specific issue, they raise public awareness of neglected problems, challenge industry incumbents to rethink their approaches, shape future regulation and policy, and can even create entirely new markets.
What is the secret to designing a successful challenge prize?
The key to success is balance. A prize must set an ambitious, challenging goal while simultaneously providing the right mix of financial incentives and expert, non-financial support. Getting this structure right ensures you attract the best talent and give radical ideas the runway they need to evolve and succeed.
