The U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID), NASA, Department of State, and NIKE Inc. are partnering on an initiative called LAUNCH: Health. The idea behind the program is to identify, showcase, and support innovative approaches to humanity’s sustainability challenges. The second event in the LAUNCH forum series will focus on health issues related to the first 20 years of life concerning nutrition, physical activity, and preventive healthcare.
LAUNCH: Health forum will bring together entrepreneurs from around the world who will be selected based on their innovative approaches to addressing health issues. People can submit their innovative ideas through the “InnoCentive” website which allows hundreds of thousands of problem solvers throughout the world to collaborate on the posted challenges.
Innovators can submit their health related proposals via the LAUNCH Health Challenge at https://gw.innocentive.com/ar/challenge/9625880. Proposals will be accepted until September 12, 2010 when the challenge will close and the winners will be selected.
After the winners are selected, a two and a half day forum to discuss the proposals and new ideas will be held at NASA’s Kennedy Space Center on October 30-31. The winners of the competition will discuss their proposed solutions with council members who will represent business, policy, engineering, science, communications, and sustainability sectors.
“USAID is excited to team up with NASA, NIKE and the Department of State for this unique forum,” said Alex Dehgan, Director, USAID Office of Science and Technology. “We see LAUNCH as a great opportunity to support innovators and entrepreneurs who are helping provide sustainable solutions to today’s biggest development challenges.”
