InnoCentive Secures $7.3 Million in Series B-2 Funding

InnoCentive is now part of Wazoku

Waltham, Mass. – August 17, 2009 – On the heels of President Obama’s proclamation that the future of America’s economic prosperity hinges on its ability to embrace the “spirit of innovation,” InnoCentive, Inc., the market leader in crowdsourced innovation, today announced that it closed a Series B-2 round of funding for $7.3 million led by New York-based venture firm Spencer Trask Ventures, Inc., with both new and existing investors.

“InnoCentive is the market leader and their growth in the past year has been impressive,” said John Heidenreich, president, Spencer Trask Ventures Inc.  “We are excited to help build even more value into the company during this next phase of expansion.”

The new capital will be used to expand sales reach, marketing efforts, further product development and enhance global initiatives, including the opening of an office in Europe.

The company has made notable progress in the last six months including:

• Implemented its full suite of offerings, including the new InnoCentive@Work product.
• Launched the new Fast Feedback Program, designed to quickly and efficiently guide Seeker clients through the process of capturing direct consumer feedback on InnoCentive Ideation Challenge submissions.
• Announced its new strategic consulting offering.  Led by Stephen Shapiro, these new business services will help organizations determine their readiness for innovation, develop custom innovation approaches, and learn how best to engage in the cultural changes necessary to be successful.
• Established a new nature.com Open Innovation Pavilion in a joint effort with the Nature Publishing Group (NPG), a leading scientific and medical publisher, to provide a hub for scientific collaboration and open innovation.
• Announced the renewal of its partnership with The Rockefeller Foundation which links non-profit organizations with the company’s network of more than 180,000 Solvers to solve some of the most difficult problems facing poor and vulnerable people in the developing countries. Since 2006, InnoCentive has featured 10 Challenges with The Rockefeller Foundation resulting in an eighty percent success rate.

“The success of the Series B-2 Financing is a significant vote of confidence in our company and our ambitions to change the face of innovation forever,” said Dwayne Spradlin, CEO of InnoCentive. “Traditional modes of innovation desperately need to evolve, and this additional capital ensures that InnoCentive will continue to lead the charge.”

To learn more information about InnoCentive, visit https://www.innocentive.com/.

About InnoCentive, Inc.

InnoCentive was founded in 2001 to help companies innovate better. InnoCentive built the first global web community for open innovation, enabling scientists, engineers, professionals and entrepreneurs to collaborate to deliver breakthrough solutions for R&D-driven organizations. InnoCentive Seekers, who collectively spend billions of dollars on R&D, submit complex problems to the InnoCentive Marketplace where more than 180,000 engineers, scientists, inventors, business people, and research organizations in more than 175 countries are invited to solve them. Solvers who deliver the most innovative solutions receive financial awards ranging up to US$1,000,000. InnoCentive@Work, InnoCentive’s Software as a Service offering, helps organizations make the most of internal resources by uniting experts from all areas of a company in an open innovation environment that encourages cross-fertilization of ideas. For more information on InnoCentive, go to: https://www.innocentive.com/.

Press contact:

Connie French
InnoCentive Marketing Director
978-482-3300
press@innocentive.com