Google has reportedly been enlisted as a corporate sponsor for 10 new X Prize competition.
What is an X Prize?
You may remember, SpaceShipOne took the first Anasari X PRIZE for spaceflight.
An X PRIZE is a multi-million dollar award given to the first team to achieve a specific goal, set by the X PRIZE Foundation, which has the potential to benefit humanity. Rather than awarding money to honor past achievements or directly funding research, an X PRIZE incites innovation by tapping into our competitive and entrepreneurial spirits.
The X PRIZE Foundation began a revolution in private spaceflight with the $10 million Ansari X PRIZE. On October 4, 2004, the Mojave Aerospace Ventures team, led by famed aircraft designer Burt Rutan and financed by Microsoft co-founder Paul Allen, captured the Ansari X PRIZE. The world took notice of this great achievement and the winning SpaceShipOne is now hanging in the Smithsonian National Air & Space Museum.
X PRIZE competitions capture the imagination of the public and speed radical breakthroughs that can ultimately change the way we see ourselves and how we live on this planet. Stay tuned as the X PRIZE Foundation unveils new X PRIZEs to spark revolutions in the space, medicine, energy, automotive, education, environmental, and social arenas.
Without a formal announcement from either Google or the X Prize Foundation, it still remains to be seen how much support Google is offering, however, Google is listed as a corporate sponsor and Larry Page is quoted on the website:
“The success that the X PRIZE Foundation has achieved so far with minimal resources is astounding. It is the kind of leverage that we all look for. The X PRIZE model has huge potential to unlock the innovation around the grand challenges that are important to each of us.”
- Larry Page, Co-Founder, Google, Inc.
What do you think, is Google trying to be a positive role model for other corporations to promote the demise of social problems? Or, are they just casting their net to a broader audience?
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