Sometimes called crowdsourced innovation. The term originated with Henry Chesbrough; the practical version drops the academic framing.
Open innovation is the practice of drawing innovation inputs from outside the organisation — universities, startups, students, communities — rather than relying solely on internal research and development. The structure varies: sponsored challenges, ideation contests, partnerships with academic groups, scout networks for emerging tech.
The practical case for open innovation is that the talent and perspective relevant to a hard problem rarely all sit inside one organisation. Companies that engage external talent through structured channels — sponsored challenges, hackathons, university partnerships — often surface ideas and candidates they would not have found through internal processes.
Sponsoring an Ewance challenge is a lean form of open innovation. The sponsor brings a real problem; students from across regions and disciplines work on it; the sponsor sees both the deliverables and the candidates whose work stood out. The output is innovation input plus early-funnel candidate signal — neither of which require a multi-year partnership commitment to access.
The fastest way to know whether challenge-based learning fits you is to ship one.
