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Ideas
for sale? Go global!
As portals
providing idea interchanges get popular worldwide, scientists and technocrats
are starting to appreciate the convenience of solving global problems while
enjoying the convenience of home, writes MOHAN BABU
Most of us in the
IT industry appreciate the power of innovative solutions. The e-commerce
revolution in its early days spawned dreams of revolutionising business models,
increasing productivity gains and changing the way consumers dealt with
corporations. Some of the predicted changes are already here, albeit taking
place in a slower, steadier way. Online banking, trading stocks, auctions, etc,
are already a way of life for many of us. Businesses too have benefited
tremendously from the productivity gains stemming from the instant availability
of data.
The e-commerce
revolution also led to the innovation in a number of other areas. Many “new”
ideas bombed, some hibernated and a few succeeded. One such idea that hibernated
for a while before taking hold is the solutions marketplace. The idea behind the
solutions marketplace is very simple—businesses pose cryptic problems that they
don’t have the right in-house expertise to solve (or it would take a great
effort and infrastructure to solve). Instead of hiring consultants or
specialists from a local talent pool and trying to solve the problem, companies
are realising that they can benefit from the global availability of intellectual
capital. During the height of the dotcom boom, a number of online ventures were
founded to act as solutions exchanges. A few like Sabeer Bhatia’s Arzoo didn’t
even take off while the likes of eLance continue to limp along. One such
exchange that specialises in solving complex problems in the chemical industry
is the portal launched by the pharmaceutical giant Eli Lilly,
called
InnoCentive Inc (URL: http://www.innocentive.com). The portal was initially
launched by Eli Lilly to solve its own in-house problems but has now attracted
the attention of other multinational giants too. These companies post
challenging synthetic organic chemistry problems and request the world chemical
community to solve them.
Dr Apparao Satyam,
principal scientist at Glenmark Pharmaceuticals, one of the participants of this
forum who recently won about $75,000 in rewards by solving a complex problem
describes the workings of the portal: “There are two types of problems-The first
category involves paper synthesis where a scientist/chemist just offers his
solution to a problem based on his/her scientific knowledge. The best solution
to the problem will be selected by InnoCentive scientists and the respective
solver will be awarded cash prize. Since these problems do not require
experimental verification of the proposed solution, InnoCentive offers cash
rewards in the range of $1000-$5000 (depending on the complexity of the
problem).
They also offer
problems that require the solver to not only propose a solution to it, but the
scientist has to actually verify his proposed solution experimentally in his/her
laboratory using his/her own resources. Each problem comes with certain minimum
requirements to be met and the scientist has to actually make the chemical
compound in his laboratory using his proposed route and submit a multi-gram
sample of the prepared compound to the InnoCentive, along with a detailed
experimental procedures and analytical data with in the deadline set by the
InnoCentive for that particular problem. Since these type of problems need lab
work to solve them, they are called “Wet Chemistry” problems. These types of
problems carry cash rewards in the range of $15,000 to $100,000 (depending on
the complexity of the problem). The best solution to a problem will be awarded
the InnoCentive prize. Finally, the scientist needs to transfer intellectual
property right to InnoCentive to claim the award.”
Dr Satyam
described the problem he solved for and InnoCentive seeker as “Regarding the
InnoCentive problem that I had solved, an InnoCentive seeker was in need of a
novel and economical synthetic route to produce kilogram quantities of
7-Formyl-Indole, which might be an Active Pharmaceutical Ingredient (API). In
fact, 7-formyl-indole is a known compound and is commercially available at a
price of US $310.00/1 gram of 98% pure compound. By using our novel method, we
produced 5gm of 7-formyl-Indole (>99.6% purity) for less than US $200 (which is
seven to eight times cheaper). The seeker can now produce kilogram quantities of
7-formyl-Indole using our new method. Since I am an employee, any research work
done by me will become the property of my employer and only my employer can
transfer the intellectual property rights related to InnoCentive problems. My
employer has transferred those IP rights to that invention, and obtained the
award money, which will be used to fund our on-going in-house research and
development. Since we have transferred the IP rights to the invention to
InnoCentive to claim the award money, InnoCentive has acquired the rights to
utilise that technology.”
Mumbai-based Dr
Satyam and his peers are already reaping the benefits of globalisation, using
Web technologies as a tool. Working away at their labs in India, they are
positioning themselves to solve complex problems for their global clients. This
is exactly the kind of revolution that the Internet and e-commerce technologies
were supposed to bring forth. Tightening of immigration laws in the West
notwithstanding, globalisation of portals such as those which provide idea
interchanges continue unabated. If anything, scientists and technocrats are
starting to appreciate the convenience of solving global problems while enjoying
the convenience of home. Who says only thing that can be successfully outsourced
is IT?
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