Previous winners told us that they didn’t start in the lab, but with their own lives. They combined their interests and talents with something they wanted to change.

We created the Idea Springboard. A web app that serves videos, books, patents, and articles – based on what you love, what you’re good at and a problem you want to change. Giving entrants inspirational starting points, and the chance to find an idea as soon as they entered the site.

Registering not with the daunting task to come up with a world-changing idea, but hopefully with the seed of one.

So far, 35% of registered users used the springboard, at least 5 times each, to total over 220,000 individual searches. Spending on average 11 minutes on the site, opening over 1 million links.

The supporting film has 110,000 video views, 11,000 posters have been printed by teachers. 13% of all registered users came from the interactive banner campaign.

Comparing to last year, the ratio of registered contestants who submitted projects is up by 220%. 53% of submitted projects used the Idea Springboard.