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A worldwide hardware design challenge focused on globally impactful innovation.
This year, we are partnering with leading nonprofits to tackle some of the world’s toughest problems across conservation, disaster relief, renewable resources, and assistive devices. The Hackaday Prize connects you to engineers, expert mentors, and other powerful resources to develop dynamic solutions for those who need it most.
We’re partnering with nonprofits who have proven an unwavering dedication to each of their unique missions. Each organization receives $10,000 in donations and an open source solution to their challenges.
Conservation x LabsDevelop solutions to combat invasive species in marine and island environments, and help craft tools for protecting our natural ocean landscapes.
Full design brief United Cerebral Palsy Los AngelesCreate or redesign open source assistive tools and devices usable by those with cerebral palsy, and/ or other physical challenges, to enable independence and creative expression.
Full design brief CalEarthDesign modular add-ons for CalEarth’s dome housing models within the categories of connectivity, power harvesting, lighting, heating, or water collection and storage.
Full design brief Field ReadyEngineer open source tools in the form of a versatile heat sealer/ welder, versatile UV Wand for curing UV adhesive on a variety of objects, and a medical fluid warming system, all of which can be built in the field.
Full design brief
With grand prizes, bootstrap funds, and microgrants, there are more opportunities to win than ever! The top solution will be produced in a limited run and deployed in the field.
$50,000 + Supplyframe DesignLab Residency
$10,000 each
$3,000 each
$5,000
* Best solution per nonprofit in response to their open call challenges.
Dream Team challenges represent an opportunity to join a three-person task force. If selected, you will be awarded two $3,000 microgrants in June and July. Apply individually, or as a team.
Craft solutions that reduce “soak time” for fishing gear, ultimately reducing the amount of lost or abandoned items in the world’s oceans.
Full design briefDesign a universal remote for those with cerebral palsy, or other physical challenges, that easily connects to devices and utilizes a joystick, touch pad, or large buttons.
Full design briefDevelop modular solutions that automate steps in SuperAdobe Dome construction, in order to make the process more efficient, less taxing, or more cost effective.
Full design briefDesign a means of quality control that remotely tracks and evaluates solutions, protects consumers, and ensures a roadmap for reporting and repair.
Full design brief
The community vote has ended! These top 20 projects will each receive $500 to help bootstrap their idea.
There is still time to enter the prize!
FieldKit
Environmental Sensing for Everyone
Dexter
High Precision Robotic Arm
OSUG
Open-Source Underwater Glider
With the entry period starting May 19th and ending August 31st, entrants have plenty of time to develop their projects.
The top one hundred entries by August 31st, 2020 will go on to the finals where our esteemed judges will award the grand prize of $50,000, and other top prizes.
We’ve assembled a panel of experts in the fields of social innovation, engineering, design, and product development, to evaluate entries and select our finalists.
Head of Mechanical Engineering & Manufacturing, Level 5, Self-Driving Division, Lyft
Alfred has over 16 years of engineering experience developing products for companies like Fibit, Amazon, and Motorola. He is the Head of Mechanical Engineering & Manufacturing at Lyft’s level 5 self-driving division. His team is responsible for the design and development of features that ensure reliability, and safety in autonomous vehicles.
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Professor, School of Engineering and Schulze School of Entrepreneurship Director, Playful Learning Lab
Innovation Director and co-founder, Center for Engineering Education. AnnMarie is a Professor in the School of Engineering and the Opus College of Business at the University of St. Thomas. She is the author of "Making Makers: Kids, Tools, and the Future of Innovation," the founder and director of the Playful Learning Lab, and served as Founding Executive Director of the Maker Education Initiative.
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Senior Program Manager + Creative Technologist, Microsoft; Founder & Designer, Art by Physicist
Kitty Yeung is a physicist, artist, maker, fashion designer, and musician. She works at Microsoft Quantum Systems on quantum computing education, and is passionate about integrating technology, science, design, and art into all manner of different projects.
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Inventor, Environmentalist, Entrepreneur, Educator
Cesar Jung-Harada is a French-Japanese designer, ocean roboticist, founder of the makerspace network MakerBay Group, and lead of the Design+ bachelor of Arts and Science at the University of Hong Kong.
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Director, DAI Maker Lab
Rob Ryan-Silva has more than 25 years of experience working on aid projects in some of the world’s most challenging environments. As Director of DAI’s Maker Lab, he builds hardware, and capacities to build hardware, in support of international development projects around the world.
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Founder and Executive Director, Girls Garage
Emily Pilloton is the founder and Executive Director of the nonprofit design and building program Girls Garage. Trained in architecture, design, and building, Emily is a fierce advocate for girls in STEM. She has taught creative and vocational skills to over 1500 young people.
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Innovation Lead – Global, Field Ready
Andrew is an electronics, systems, and information engineer who got involved in humanitarian relief work as a student. He was the first Chief Executive of Engineers for Without Borders UK, and joined Field Ready soon after, working from Geneva, Nepal, or the Pacific region, and now works from London.
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UCPLA Chair, Board of Directors
Dr. JJ Levenstein is a trusted Fellow of the American Academy of Pediatrics and has been involved with the United Cerebral Palsy of Los Angeles (UCPLA), Ventura, and Santa Barbara Counties since 2007. After spending the last 30 years caring for children in Los Angeles, she is now retired from private practice.
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Chief Design Engineer and Bottle Washer
Adrian Freed designs audio ICs and musical instruments at nOmni. He works on surface and whole body interaction, gesture signal processing, and terrascale integration of data from wearable and built environments, sensor/actuator systems employing electrotextiles, and new solutions to address the unique accessibility challenges of disabled people.
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PhD -- Senior Scientist and Lab Manager, Conservation X Labs
Chad Gallinat is the Senior Scientist and Lab Manager at Conservation X Labs, where he works on both the Open Innovation team running Prizes and Challenges, as well as the Garage team building conservation technologies. He has a PhD in Materials Engineering and over a decade of experience working in clean energy.
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Principal Product Manager, Smart Home at Amazon
Advisor, X - the Moonshot Factory. Victor has spent the last ten years at NASA/JPL building AR/VR applications for scientists, engineers, and astronauts. He has recently taken a new role at Amazon to craft future product strategy and a roadmap for the Smart Home business.
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Design Entrepreneur
Nabil is a design strategist and entrepreneur, with a love for building products that delight. He currently helps distributed teams make great work happen as an Enterprise Account Executive at the visual collaboration startup MURAL.
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Designer, Educator
Lara is a designer, educator, and fabricator whose work lies at the intersection of craft and technology, often including e-textiles and custom interfaces. She's written and taught educational material for various organizations, including Instructables.com and the California College of Arts. She is one of four co-organizers of eTextile Spring Break.
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CFO and Executive Director, CalEarth Institute
Sheefteh and her brother have been running CalEarth since their father passed away in 2008. Khalili founded CalEarth in 1991 in Hesperia, California to train students and apprentices and conduct research on earth architecture solutions. CalEarth solutions for human shelter have been published by NASA, and received the Aga Khan award for Architecture.
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Founder, Conservify
Shah Selbe is the founder of Conservify and a National Geographic Explorer and Fellow. He is an engineer and conservation technologist that works with communities, NGOs, and developing countries to identify and deploy conservation technologies. He founded Conservify, the first solely conservation technology makerspace and nonprofit prototyping lab.
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Business Development Manager, Global Partners and Solutions, Microsoft
Zoe is an experienced business development expert in the tech industry, with a focus on accelerating strategic partnerships and ecosystem support in the Internet of Things (IoT) space, retail tech, smart energy/ building, agriculture, and artificial Intelligence through IoT (e.g., intelligent/virtual personal assistants for Auto and IoT devices).
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Fellow, NYU
Clarissa Redwine passionately supports community-driven innovation. Currently, she's studying open source hardware as a Fellow at NYU. As Senior Design and Tech Outreach Lead for Kickstarter, she guided hardware creators in successful funding campaigns, from telescope arrays to $1 microscopes. She also co-founded a hackerspace in her Texas college town that’s still humming today.
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Lead Industrial Designer, AT&T
Jasen is an experienced Industrial Designer with a history developing hardware from concept design, through tooling, and to market launch. Jasen brings technical analysis together with creative synthesis; expressing science and engineering through form; utilizing products as enablers of our cultural values. Jasen is working to conceive not only objects, but the scenarios and strategies that allow for their connection between environment, society, and industry.
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Chair, Product Design, ArtCenter
Chief Design Officer, Hacker Design Group. Chris Hacker is Chief Design Officer of Hacker Design Group, a design consultancy specializing in Product and Brand Design Management and Sustainability Design. He brings both design and leadership experience to the Product Design Department and to the ArtCenter College of Design as a whole.
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Electronic Engineer, Teenage Engineering
Alberto has been fascinated with sound and machines since his teenage years. He graduated from Politecnico di Torino and the University of Illinois At Chicago, then moved to Stockholm to start his career in music technology, developing hardware for a growing start-up called "Elk." He now designs electronics for Teenage Engineering.
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Mechatronics Engineer, The Jet Propulsion Laboratory
Michelle grew up working on a small farm, then transitioned to the fashion industry before settling into her career as a Mechatronics Engineer, now working at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory. Michelle founded Mind Makers, a non-profit organization which aims to empower adults with unconventional backgrounds to develop their engineering tool boxes.
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Director, Entrepreneurship and Professional Practice, ArtCenter
Robbie Nock is the Director of Entrepreneurship and Professional Practice at ArtCenter College of Design. His background spans media production, new technology and startup development. At ArtCenter, Robbie produces academic programs and provides strategic services for a global community of creatives, entrepreneurs, educators and investors.
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Associate Professor, ArtCenter College of Design
Interaction Designer & Futurist. Julian Scaff is a multi-disciplinary designer and futurist. His areas of expertise include user experience design, interaction design, emerging technologies and futurecasting. Julian is Associate Professor of Interaction Design at Art Center College of Design and does consulting for clients such as Hitachi, Fidelity and NASA/JPL.
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Join top engineers and industry leaders in small groups to discuss ideas and best practices. The ideal place for inspiration to strike!
Engineer & Domestic US COVID-19 Response Coordinator, Field Ready
Catherine Hebson is an engineer and maker. Most recently, she spent several years in early-stage product development at a medical device company. Her expertise lies in rapid prototyping and product ideation. Prior to that, she worked in a makerspace, designing workshop curriculum and teaching courses.
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Adaptive Design Manager
A native of Phnom Penh, Cambodia, Aragna Ker was born in 1974. He received his BFA in Painting from the San Francisco Art Institute in 1999, and his MFA in Sculpture at Claremont Graduate University in 2004. He is currently the Adaptive Design Manager for United Cerebral Palsy of Los Angeles.
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Rapid Prototyping Technician, Supplyframe DesignLab
Bruce is the Rapid Prototyping Technician at Supplyframe DesignLab. Prior to this, he managed the fabrications shops at Art Center and worked at CalTech’s Mechanical Engineering Lab, where he has advised on and helped to develop numerous engineering, research, and creative projects.
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Product Development Engineer, Supplyframe DesignLab
Giovanni is the Product Development Engineer at Supplyframe DesignLab. He has designed and developed hundreds of products, including consumer electronics, kitchenware, and urban furniture for a number of global markets. Through his experience he has honed his expertise in rapid prototyping and DFM in a variety of materials.
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Director of Product, Hackaday
Sophi Kravitz is an electrical engineer and artist. She works as Director of Product at Hackaday where she brings the hardware community closer together by building partnerships, creating experiences, and public speaking. Past projects include a wedding badge, a mini-blimp game, and playground rides.
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Product Engineer & Conservation Technology Program Manager at Conservation X Labs
Sam is an engineer dedicated to developing technological solutions to issues that have been underserved by the technical community. At Conservation X Labs, Sam helped establish the internal Innovation Foundry, aiming to create ventures that are both beneficial for nature and economically viable, from idea to market.
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Audio Engineer, Hardware Developer, Evil Tech, inc & XR CREATIVE, inc.
Erika is an Audio Engineer and Hardware Developer who is working on spatial, immersive, and interactive ambisonic audio in the VR/XR space. Erika co-founded Earl Virtual Innovation Lab (EVIL Tech), and XR Creative. She is currently supporting the NASA JPL VITAL ventilator project with parts procurement, design for manufacture, and material requirement planning.
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Founder & CEO, Cornfield Electronics
Mitch is the President and CEO of Cornfield Electronics, and co-founder of the Noisebridge hackerspace in San Francisco. He also invented TV-B-Gone, co-founded a Silicon Valley startup, pioneered VR technology, is an author and teacher, and gives talks and workshops around the world. Mitch promotes hackerspaces, open source hardware, and mentors wherever he goes.
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Lab Manager, Astranis
Eric is a Mechanical Engineer based in the San Francisco Bay Area. Eric leverages his vast experience in product design, mass manufacturing, and rapid prototyping to help companies ship hardware.
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Technical Director, CalEarth Institute
Marco Cervantes is an environmental engineer based out of the San Diego area. Since 2010, he has been teaching and building SuperAdobe structures. He has led workshops at CalEarth Institute in California, as well as in Spain, Italy, and Mexico. As CalEarth’s Technical Director, he works to design and implement SuperAdobe training.
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Developer Engagement, Twilio
Christine has worked in technology, media, medicine, and art. During her residency at Supplyframe DesignLab, Christine developed her HaRoCo robots, which are designed to help people achieve personal goals, become healthier, and feel more emotionally grounded. Her work meshes the advantages of modern, Internet connected, and "smart" technology with our everyday, tactile, emotive world.
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Co-founder & Principal, ThingM
Tod is the creator of the blink(1) notification light and the BlinkM Smart LED. He co-founded CRASH Space, author of “Hacking Roomba”, contributes to MAKE mag, and has a few patents.
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Ecosystem Manager, Arm
Alessandro is the ecosystem manager in the automotive and IoT division at Arm. Alessandro is part of a global team that focuses on driving innovation by supporting a diverse range of developers building solutions in IoT, embedded robotics, drones, machine learning and security. Before moving to this role, Alessandro has worked as a design and validation engineer for Arm IP, some of which are in a variety of products you use every day.
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Thank you to these donors for generously matching Supplyframe in contributions to our 2020 nonprofit partners.
