Monday, May 13, 2019

XPRIZE Foundation Eyes Wildfire Detection, Suppression

Marina Del Rey-based XPRIZE Foundation, the group which runs competitions to spur innovation in technology to help solve major societal problems or very hard technical problems, says it is going to launch a new prize to spur ideas for wildfire detection and suppression. According to XPRIZE chairman Peter Diamandis, along with California Governor Gavin Newsom, the XPRIZE Foundation will shortly be launching a competition which will seek to spur developing of innovative technology to detect and put out fires before they get too big, with a prize pot of between $5M and $20M. Diamandis said the prize will be launched by early 2020. The exact amount of the prize, and the sponsor that would fund the prize effort were not announced by the foundation.