{"id":31390,"date":"2018-11-13T12:55:59","date_gmt":"2018-11-13T17:55:59","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/digital.hbs.edu\/platform-rctom\/submission\/virgin-hyperloop-one-will-open-innovation-lead-to-its-reality\/"},"modified":"2018-11-13T13:15:38","modified_gmt":"2018-11-13T18:15:38","slug":"virgin-hyperloop-one-will-open-innovation-lead-to-its-reality","status":"publish","type":"hck-submission","link":"https:\/\/d3.harvard.edu\/platform-rctom\/submission\/virgin-hyperloop-one-will-open-innovation-lead-to-its-reality\/","title":{"rendered":"Virgin Hyperloop One: Will Open Innovation Lead to Its Reality?"},"content":{"rendered":"

Virgin Hyperloop One: Will Open Innovation Lead to Its Reality?<\/u><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>(Hyperloop One\u2019s new prototype design[1]<\/strong><\/a>)<\/em><\/p>\n

With Virgin Hyperloop One\u2019s announcement of its new CEO Jay Walker two days ago, the company\u2019s dream of underground, ultra-high-speed transportation seems to be inching closer to reality. Walker, who brings experience running more traditional transportation providers including the New York MTA and Motivate, the BlueBike operator, sees his new role as an opportunity to integrate his experience with \u201cthe first really new and innovative transportation technology in over 100 years\u201d[2]<\/sup><\/a>. What Walker is referring to is the Hyperloop, conceived in 2013 by Elon Musk as an alternate form of transportation in which pressurized tunnels transport pods of people or goods, enabled by the frictionless environment to travel at high speeds[3]<\/a>. Indeed, one of Walker\u2019s first tasks will be to distill the innovative work generated by the 10 winners of last year\u2019s Hyperloop One Challenge, an open innovation contest that the company launched to crowdsource the most viable routes for the Hyperloop.<\/p>\n

The company\u2019s open innovation contest has accelerated the Hyperloop\u2019s product development and commercial feasibility by tapping into players who not only bear the technological chops to improve the existing system, but also bring together local, public entities who are necessary partners for the Hyperloop\u2019s ultimate implementation. Fashioned after board member Peter Diamandis\u2019 X-Prize Foundation, The Challenge evaluated over 2,600 teams representing \u201cindividuals, universities, companies, and governments\u201d who developed \u201cproposals for deploying Hyperloop One’s innovative transportation technology in their region\u201d[4]<\/a>. The Challenge first filtered through thousands of proposals down to 35 semi-finalists; then 4 industry experts in the Challenge identified 10 finalists who bore the greatest potential in \u201cwell-defined routes, stakeholder involvement, and innovative ideas around implementation and application\u201d[5]<\/a>. A natural tool for sifting through thousands of possible route combinations, the Challenge helped Virgin Hyperloop One focus on the currently most viable routes in the world while also identifying an ecosystem of public agency partners up front, expediting the coordination between the players necessary for a Hyperloop to take form. Through the Global Challenge, the company secured its public-private partnership with a US state government, undertaking a feasibility study on a proposed route with the Colorado Department of Transportation and AECOM[6]<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>(Hyperloop One finalists[7]<\/strong><\/a>)<\/em><\/p>\n

Moving forward, Hyperloop One will work with the 10 finalists to provide \u201cinitial ridership forecasts, business case and preliminary technical analysis of the route and corridor, tailored to the needs of the individual route\u201d[8]<\/a>. Each team will have access to Hyperloop One\u2019s business and technical leaders, who will host in-country workshops, as well as its global partner network, who can help \u201csharpen the feasibility and scope of the potential routes\u201d [9]<\/a>. The company also held its first ever Hyperloop One Global Summit, during which all winning teams and government and industry partners came together to start building their open platform[10]<\/strong><\/em><\/a>. <\/em><\/p>\n

The long-term goal remains to bring these 10 finalist routes to commercial fruition while building a knowledge platform about the Hyperloop. To fully integrate these open innovation ideas, Hyperloop management should consider bringing these finalist teams in-house or strike an intellectual property agreement so that they can continue to leverage the accumulated knowledge for future projects. In order to preserve a healthy exchange of ideas across the organization, Hyperloop may also consider re-aligning internal and external teams across specific work streams- for instance, route optimization, hardware improvements to the Hyperloop pod or tunnel, rather than having the finalist teams work in silos according to their route. The company can also continue crowdsourcing technological improvements, as Elon Musk has done with an annual SpaceX Pod competition [11]<\/a>. Capturing best practices from the earliest public-private partnerships should also be a core component of the Hyperloop knowledge platform in order to replicate success across future routes.<\/p>\n

As Walker tackles these challenges in his new role, two questions emerge:<\/p>\n