X Prize Foundation

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XPRIZE

Founded 1994; 28 years ago[1]

Founder Peter Diamandis

Focus Public competitions

Culver City, California

Location

Area served Exploration, Environment, Equity

Method Revolution through competition

Key people Peter Diamandis (Exec. Chairman)

Robert K. Weiss (Vice Chairman)

Anousheh Ansari (CEO)[2]

Website www.xprize.org 

XPRIZE is a non-profit organization that designs and hosts public competitions intended

to encourage technological development to benefit humanity. Their board of trustees
include James Cameron, Larry Page, Arianna Huffington, and Ratan Tata among
others.
The XPRIZE mission is to bring about "radical breakthroughs for the benefit of
humanity" through incentivized competition. It fosters high-profile competitions to
motivate individuals, companies and organizations across all disciplines to develop
innovative ideas and technologies that help solve the world's grand challenges.
The Ansari X Prize relating to spacecraft development was awarded in 2004, intended
to inspire research and development into technology for space exploration.

Contents

 1Background
 2XPRIZE unifying principles
 3Prizes and events overseen
o 3.1Past contests
 3.1.11996–2004 Ansari XPRIZE for Suborbital Spaceflight
 3.1.22007–2010 Progressive Insurance Automotive XPRIZE
 3.1.32010–2011 Wendy Schmidt Oil Cleanup XCHALLENGE
 3.1.42006–2009 Northrop Grumman Lunar Lander XCHALLENGE
 3.1.52012–2014 The Nokia Sensing XCHALLENGE
 3.1.62013–2015 The Wendy Schmidt Ocean Health XPRIZE
 3.1.72011–2017 Qualcomm Tricorder XPRIZE
 3.1.82007–2018 Google Lunar XPRIZE
 3.1.92016–2018 Anu & Naveen Jain Women's Safety XPRIZE
 3.1.102016–2018 Water Abundance XPRIZE
 3.1.112014–2019 The Global Learning XPRIZE
 3.1.122015–2019 Shell Ocean Discovery XPRIZE
 3.1.132015–2019 Adult Literacy XPRIZE
 3.1.142020 Next-Gen Mask Challenge
 3.1.152020–2021 Pandemic Response XPRIZE
o 3.2Canceled contests
 3.2.12006–2013 Archon Genomics XPRIZE
o 3.3Active contests
 3.3.12014 IBM Watson A.I. XPRIZE
 3.3.22015 NRG Cosia Carbon XPRIZE
 3.3.32018 ANA Avatar XPRIZE
 3.3.42019 Rainforest XPRIZE
 3.3.52020 Rapid Covid Testing
 3.3.62021 Gigaton Scale Carbon Removal
 4Board of directors
o 4.1Board of trustees
 5See also
 6References
 7External links

Background[edit]

SpaceShipOne Takeoff
The first, titled the Ansari XPRIZE, was presented on November 6, 2004.

The first XPRIZE – the Ansari XPRIZE – was inspired by the Orteig Prize, a $25,000
prize offered in 1919 by French hotelier Raymond Orteig for the first nonstop flight
between New York City and Paris. In 1927, underdog Charles Lindbergh won the prize
in a modified single-engine Ryan aircraft called the Spirit of St. Louis. In total, nine
teams spent $400,000 in pursuit of the Orteig Prize.
In 1996, entrepreneur Peter Diamandis offered a $10-million prize to the first privately
financed team that could build and fly a three-passenger vehicle 100 kilometers into
space twice within two weeks. The contest, later titled the Ansari XPRIZE for Suborbital
Spaceflight, motivated 26 teams from seven nations to invest more than $100 million in
pursuit of the $10 million purse. On October 4, 2004, the Ansari XPRIZE was won
by Mojave Aerospace Ventures, who successfully completed the contest in their
spacecraft SpaceShipOne. The prize was awarded in a ceremony at the Saint Louis
Science Center in St. Louis, Missouri.[3] As of 2011, the Science Center maintains
numerous exhibits about the XPRIZE.
The foundation has also created the XPRIZE Cup rocket challenge competition.

XPRIZE unifying principles[edit]

XPRIZES are monetary rewards to incentivize three primary goals:

 Attract investment from outside the sector that take new approaches to difficult
problems.
 Create significant results that are real and meaningful. Competitions have
measurable goals, and are created to promote adoption of the innovation.
 Cross national and disciplinary boundaries to encourage teams around the world to
invest the intellectual and financial capital required to solve difficult challenges.
Other organizations such as the Nobel Prize committee award prizes and financial
rewards to individuals or organizations that produce novel advances in science,
medicine and technology. One difference between the XPRIZES and other similar
organizations is awarding prizes based on the first to achieve objective 'finish line'
requirements rather than a selection committee discussing the relative merits of
different endeavors. For instance, the Archon Genomics XPRIZE target was to
sequence 100 human genomes in 10 days or less, with less than one error per 100,000
DNA base pairs, covering 98% of the genome and costing less than $10,000 per
genome (this prize was cancelled because it was outpaced by innovation).
The prize can increase attention to endeavors that otherwise might not receive much
publicity. For example, attempts in the recent Lunar Lander competition have been well
publicized in the media, increasing visibility of both the foundation and the participants.
With the Ansari XPRIZE, XPRIZE established a model in which offering a prize for
achieving a specific goal can stimulate entrepreneurial investment. Since then, new
challenges have expanded into a range of other fields. XPRIZE is developing new
prizes in Exploration (Space and Oceans), Life Sciences, Energy & Environment,
Education and Global Development. Some hope the prizes will help improve lives,
create equity of opportunity and stimulate new, important discoveries.

Prizes and events overseen[edit]

As of January 2018, there are seven completed contests, eight active contests and one
contest that has been canceled.
Past contests[edit]
1996–2004 Ansari XPRIZE for Suborbital Spaceflight[edit]
Main article: Ansari X Prize
Astronaut Mike Melvill after his award-winning September 29, 2004 spaceflight

The Ansari XPRIZE for Suborbital Spaceflight was the first prize from the foundation. It
successfully challenged teams to build private spaceships capable of carrying three
people and fly two times within two weeks to open the space frontier. The first part of
the Ansari XPRIZE requirements was fulfilled by Mike Melvill on September 29, 2004,
On SpaceShipOne, a spacecraft designed by Burt Rutan and financed by Paul Allen,
co-founder and former CEO of Microsoft. On that ship, Melvill broke the 100-kilometer
(62.5 mi) mark, internationally recognized as the boundary of outer space. Brian
Binnie completed the second part of the requirements on October 4, 2004, winning the
prize. As a result, US$10 million was awarded to the winner, but more than $100 million
was invested in new technologies in pursuit of the prize. Sir Richard Branson, Jeff
Bezos and others are reputed to be creating a personal spaceflight industry.
Awarding this first prize gave XPRIZE as much publicity as the winners themselves.
After the 2004 success there was ample media coverage to afford both Scaled
Composites and XPRIZE additional support for them to expand and continue to pursue
their aims. Following this early success several other XPRIZES were announced that
have yet to be awarded despite various attempts to meet the requirements.
The Ansari XPRIZE won the Space Foundation's Douglas S. Morrow Public Outreach
Award in 2005. The award is given annually to an individual or organization that has
made significant contributions to public awareness of space programs. [4]
2007–2010 Progressive Insurance Automotive XPRIZE[edit]
Main article: Automotive X Prize
The goal of the Progressive Insurance Automotive XPRIZE was to design, build and
race super-efficient vehicles that achieve 100 MPGe (2.35 liter/100 kilometer) efficiency,
produce less than 200 grams/mile well-to-wheel CO2 equivalent emissions, and could be
manufactured for the mass market.[5]
The winners of the competition were announced on September 16, 2010. [6]

 Team Edison2 won the $5 million Mainstream competition with its four-
passenger Very Light Car, obtaining 102.5 MPGe running on E85 fuel.
 Team Li-Ion Motors won the $2.5 million Alternative Side-by-Side competition with
their aerodynamic Wave-II electric vehicle achieving 187 MPGe.
 Team X-Tracer Switzerland won the $2.5 million Alternative Tandem competition
with their 205.3 MPGe faired electric motorcycle.
2010–2011 Wendy Schmidt Oil Cleanup XCHALLENGE[edit]
Main article: Wendy Schmidt Oil Cleanup X Challenge
The Wendy Schmidt Oil Cleanup XCHALLENGE was introduced on July 29, 2010. The
$1 million prize had a goal to inspire a new generation of innovative solutions that will
speed the pace of cleaning up seawater surface oil resulting from spillage from ocean
platforms, tankers, and other sources. The team of Elastec/American Marine won the
challenge by developing a device that skims oil off water three times faster than
previously existing technology.[7]
2006–2009 Northrop Grumman Lunar Lander XCHALLENGE[edit]
Main article: Lunar Lander Challenge
The Northrop Grumman Lunar Lander XCHALLENGE (NGLLXPC) was a competition
(co-hosted by NASA) to build precise, efficient small rocket systems. It was introduced
in 2006 and the US$1 million top prize was awarded on November 5, 2009 to Masten
Space Systems, led by David Masten; while Armadillo Aerospace, led by id Software
founder John Carmack took home the second place prize of US$500,000, plus an
additional $500,000 in 2008.
2012–2014 The Nokia Sensing XCHALLENGE[edit]
The Nokia Sensing XCHALLENGE goal is accelerating the use of sensors and sensing
technology to tackle health care problems and find ways for people to monitor and
maintain their personal well-being. It was composed of two distinct Challenges held in
2013 and 2014. It was announced in 2012 [8] and 12 finalists announced in 2013.[9] On
November 11, 2014, the winner was named to be team DMI, led by Eugene Y. Chan,
MD, whose entry was the rHEALTH technology which used lasers and nanostrips to
perform vast multiplexing on samples.[10] In this competition, prize purses totaling $2.25
million were awarded.
2013–2015 The Wendy Schmidt Ocean Health XPRIZE[edit]
The Wendy Schmidt Ocean Health XPRIZE is a $2 million competition to improve our
understanding of ocean acidification. [11] On July 20, 2015, the winners of the challenge
were announced.[12]
2011–2017 Qualcomm Tricorder XPRIZE[edit]
Main article: Tricorder X Prize
The Qualcomm Tricorder XPRIZE was announced on May 10, 2011, and is sponsored
by Qualcomm Foundation. It was officially launched on January 10, 2012. [13] The $10
million prize is awarded for creating a mobile device that can "diagnose patients better
than or equal to a panel of board certified physicians". [14] The name is taken from
the tricorder device in Star Trek which can be used to instantly diagnose ailments. [15] No
team met all the requirements needed to win the full prize purse. Reduced prizes were
made to the strongest performers (US$2.6 million for Final Frontier Medical Devices,
US$1 million for Dynamical Biomarkers, and $100,000 for Cloud DX, named "Bold Epic
Innovator"). For the first time at any XPRIZE, the leftover funds from the main prize
purse were diverted for consumer testing for commercialization ($3.8 million) and for
adapting tricorders for use in hospitals in developing countries ($1.6 million).
2007–2018 Google Lunar XPRIZE[edit]
Main article: Google Lunar X Prize
The Google Lunar XPRIZE was introduced on September 13, 2007. The goal of the
prize was similar to that of the Ansari XPRIZE, to inspire a new generation of private
investment in space exploration and technology. The challenge called for teams to
compete in successfully launching, landing, and operating a rover on the lunar surface.
The prize was going to award $20 million to the first team to land a rover on the moon
that successf