Ramona Adams
Siemens and the Energy Department-led Jump online crowdsourcing community have partnered to crowdsource building technology ideas that could support interaction between personal smart devices and public facilities.
The company said Monday the Jump challenge seeks concepts, use cases and business models that could help building occupants in commercial, public or corporate spaces to achieve the level of device interconnectivity and automation in private homes.
“Crowdsourcing innovations in building technology has the potential to generate the kinds of ideas that will push this industry forward by generations, rather than iterations,” said Dave Hopping, president of Siemens’ U.S.-based building technologies division.
“It’s a powerful way to harness the creative and competitive spirit of individuals, entrepreneurs and small companies, enabling them to solve some of the challenges faced in our industry,” Hopping added.
Siemens plans to award $5,000 in cash for the top submission while the winning participant might get a chance to meet with experts from Siemens and Oak Ridge National Laboratory on a potential collaboration to bring the idea to market.
ORNL could also provide up to $20,000 in technical support that will cover prototype development, testing and/or third party validation, Siemens added.
The winner could also participate in DOE’s Small Business Voucher pilot and if approved, ORNL will provide technical support worth up to $300,000, Siemens noted.
Interested participants can submit ideas until Sept. 11.
Jump aims to address the gap between building technology ideas and the market through the efforts of five DoE national laboratories and private companies in the buildings sector.
