INNOVATORS THINK TANK
Innovation-as-a-Service

Your external innovation lab.

The R&D department you need—without the R&D department you don't.

We help businesses identify, test, and validate new value—without the overhead, delays, or risk of building an internal team.

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What We Do

Two powerful ways to innovate

Choose how you want to innovate: work directly with our expert team as your external innovation lab, or harness the collective genius of our global community to solve your specific challenges.

Global Innovation Network

Tap into our ecosystem of thousands of creators, innovators, and problem-solvers from diverse backgrounds and specialties worldwide.

Challenge Facilitation

We help you define the right challenge, frame it effectively, and manage the entire process from submission to solution selection.

Curated Solutions

We filter and refine submissions to ensure you only review the highest-quality, most viable solutions that match your specific needs.

VALUE
Why It Matters

Innovation is a process, not a department

Every business wants to innovate and grow. But most are focused on day-to-day delivery, not discovery. The result? Missed opportunities, wasted resources, and increased risk of disruption.

The Cost Problem

Building an internal innovation team requires significant investment—typically $400,000 to $600,000 annually—before seeing any results. Our approach delivers value at a fraction of that cost.

The Time Problem

Traditional innovation efforts often take 12-18 months to show results. Our process typically delivers actionable insights within 8-12 weeks through rapid experimentation or community challenges.

The Focus Problem

Internal innovation efforts frequently get deprioritized, caught in politics, or disconnected from real customer needs. As an external partner, we maintain objectivity and momentum.

The Solution

We don't replace your expertise—we amplify it. Whether through our expert team or global community, we bring specialized methods, diverse perspectives, and proven processes that help you learn faster and build smarter.

Our Approach

Transforming assumptions into insights

We apply a rigorous methodology to reduce innovation risk and accelerate learning. Our process is designed to validate opportunities at a fraction of the traditional cost.

First principles thinking

Innovation requires more than just creativity—it demands a structured approach to uncovering truth. We start by identifying what must be true for an idea to succeed, then design experiments to validate those assumptions.

This focus on evidence over opinions allows us to help you avoid costly mistakes and invest with confidence in opportunities that create real value.

01

Clarity

We break down complex innovation challenges into testable hypotheses, isolating the key assumptions that will determine success or failure.

02

Validation

Through focused experimentation or community challenges, we gather real-world evidence that validates or invalidates critical assumptions with minimal investment.

03

Direction

We translate experimental results or community solutions into clear insights and strategic recommendations, providing a confident path forward.

The path from assumption to insight

Hypothesis
Frame key assumptions
Design
Create elegant experiments
Execute
Run rapid tests
Analyze
Extract meaningful data
Action
Make informed decisions
COMMUNITY
Global Innovation Network

Tap into a global ecosystem of innovators

The smallest viable unit of innovation is not a start-up, it's innovators. Our global community of innovators brings fresh perspectives, cutting-edge skills, and diverse expertise to your toughest challenges.

North America Europe Asia Africa South America Australia
4500+
Innovators
65+
Countries
98%
Solution Rate

How community challenges work

We've built a venture builder platform that mobilizes thousands of innovators to create solutions for specific business challenges. These aren't just concepts—they're ready-to-implement solutions created by skilled professionals using cutting-edge tools and methodologies.

⏱ Define Your Challenge

We work with you to identify and articulate a specific business challenge or opportunity that would benefit from fresh, diverse perspectives.

Clear challenge framing Defined success criteria Resource allocation
🌐 Community Activation
⚡ Solution Development
🔍 Curation & Refinement
✅ Implementation

The power of community innovation

◊

Diversity of Thought

Our community brings together perspectives from across industries, geographies, and specialties. This diversity leads to breakthrough approaches that would never emerge from a single team or department.

8× more diverse than internal teams
⚡

Speed to Solution

Traditional innovation cycles can take years. Our community model delivers multiple developed solutions in 6-8 weeks, radically accelerating your time to insight and implementation.

70% faster time to solutions
⚠

Risk Reduction

Rather than betting on a single approach, our community challenges allow you to explore multiple solution paths simultaneously, dramatically reducing the risk of pursuing the wrong direction.

5-10 solutions per challenge
✓

Implementation Ready

Our community delivers solutions that have been validated with real users and market feedback. These aren't just concepts—they're ready-to-implement approaches with demonstrated potential.

90% implementation success rate
Our Story

Built from innovation experience

The journey that shaped our unique approach to creating value for businesses.

Innovators Think Tank was born from our founder's firsthand experience with what works—and what doesn't—in innovation across multiple industries and business models.

After building several successful companies and helping hundreds of organizations with their innovation challenges, we saw a consistent pattern: businesses want to innovate and create new value, but they get stuck in the process.

That's why we created Innovators Think Tank—first as a global community connecting thousands of innovators, then as an incubator helping launch successful projects. Now, we bring this distilled expertise directly to businesses as their external innovation lab with the added power of our global community.

4500+
Global Innovators
90
Weeks of Events
$10M+
Value Created
Results

What our clients say

We've helped businesses across industries create and capture new value through our Innovation-as-a-Service approach.

Going through the program helped us ground our concepts in basic first principles and validating those. What a fantastic experience, we learned a lot. We were pushed and challenged, thank you for the guidance given.

John Allen
John Allen

Founder/CEO, The One Button

If you're open to challenge yourself, assumptions, and ready to pivot, I think this is the greatest experience you could have.

Masha
Masha

Founder/CEO, KUBEFilms

It doesn't matter where you are in the world, if you find the Incubator or ITT. They have the structure and right curriculum to help your ideas come to fruition.

Joshua Igbon
Joshua Igbon

Founder/CEO, it's-Creative Gille

Join Our Community

Be part of our global innovation network

Are you an innovator, entrepreneur, or creator? Join our community to participate in challenges, access resources, and connect with forward-thinking professionals worldwide.

Access Community Platform →
FAQ

Common questions

Everything you need to know about our Innovation-as-a-Service approach.

How do I know which service is right for my business?

Our External Innovation Lab is ideal when you need hands-on, focused work with a dedicated team to explore specific innovation questions. Community Challenges work best when you have a well-defined problem that would benefit from diverse solutions and perspectives. Most clients start with a strategy session where we help determine the best approach for your specific needs.

Who are the innovators in your community?

Our community includes entrepreneurs, designers, engineers, data scientists, product managers, marketers, and domain experts from around the world. Many have founded or scaled startups, worked at innovation labs of major corporations, or have specialized expertise in emerging technologies. All are vetted for their problem-solving abilities and commitment to creating real-world solutions.

How do you ensure quality of community solutions?

We implement a rigorous multi-stage process: 1) Challenge framing that attracts the right innovators, 2) A structured development framework with specific criteria and checkpoints, 3) Mentorship from our expert team throughout the process, 4) A thorough evaluation system to identify the most promising solutions, and 5) A refinement phase where selected solutions are polished to meet your specific requirements.

What happens to intellectual property?

For our External Innovation Lab services, all intellectual property created is assigned directly to your business. For Community Challenges, we structure clear agreements where finalist solutions are either assigned to your company through acquisition or licensed exclusively, depending on your preferences. We prioritize clean IP transfer in all our engagements.

How long does it take to show value?

Unlike traditional innovation approaches that can take 12-18 months to show results, our External Innovation Lab process typically delivers valuable insights within 8-12 weeks. Community Challenges generally run for 6-8 weeks from launch to final solution selection. Both approaches are designed to accelerate learning and reduce time-to-insight significantly.

How much does it cost?

Our Innovation-as-a-Service engagements are typically a fraction of the cost of building an internal innovation team. External Innovation Lab services start at $25,000 for focused engagements, while Community Challenges begin at $45,000 (including prize incentives for participants). We offer flexible engagement models based on your specific needs and the scope of innovation challenges. Contact us for a customized proposal.

Ready to innovate?

Transform uncertainty into strategic advantage

Join forward-thinking companies that use our expert team and global innovation community to outpace competitors, minimize risk, and create breakthrough value in rapidly changing markets.

Schedule a Strategy Session →
Get in touch

Let's explore how we can help

Ready to discuss how our Innovation-as-a-Service or Community Challenges could work for your business? Reach out to start the conversation.

We work with businesses across industries who are serious about creating new value for their customers but don't want the overhead and delay of building an internal innovation team. Whether you need a focused exploration or want to tap into our global community, we have a solution for you.

Email Us

insight@innovatorsthinktank.com

Call Us

+1 (720) 385-8264