With the launch of an ambitious project to inspire inventions, General Electric (GE) has joined an expanding list of large corporations that are co-creating with consumers.
Companies typically guard their patents fiercely, but GE is giving inventors access to a raft of its patents, hoping they’ll be able to turn them into winning products.
GE recently announced a partnership with Quirky, a company that specializes in helping inventors turn their concepts into marketable products.
Trial Project
GE has licensed hundreds of its patents to Quirky’s community and if this trial project goes well, thousands more will be made available to the crowd.
“At GE we are passionate about innovation at market speed, working with entrepreneurs and finding new models of business,” said Beth Comstock, SVP and chief marketing officer, GE.
“This partnership is just another way we can help inspire invention and help scale it. We are excited to see how the Quirky community uses tools from our scientists and technologists around the world to develop products in an entirely different way.”
The open innovation project consists of two parts:
The project is not just for inventors as anyone, from stay-at-home mums to students can take part. It’s another example of how social media is being used to tap into the smarts and creativity of online communities for product development.
For more details about this bold new open innovation endeavor including Quirky’s royalty structure click here.