Olivier Usher

Director of Development

Pronouns: He/Him

Oli is the Director of Development at Challenge Works. His remit covers the development of new breakthrough prizes, through thought leadership, communications, engagement, research and design. As part of this, he leads the search for our next Longitude Prize. He heads two teams at Challenge Works: research and design, and communications and marketing. In over ten years at Challenge Works, he has led research and design across our portfolio of challenge prizes, ranging from agriculture (the Homegrown Innovation Challenge) to disability (the Mobility Unlimited Challenge). He has also been programme director for challenge prizes in space (the Aqualunar Challenge) and artificial intelligence (the Manchester Prize) and oversees our work on evidence generation. Oli’s consultancy work has included advisory roles for ARIA, the European Commission and governments in Europe, the Middle East and the Americas. Prior to joining Nesta, he worked in scientific public relations at UCL and the European Space Agency. Outside of work, he enjoys baking sourdough bread, drinking Belgian beer and learning Italian.