200 teams to contest innovation methods final

The final of the 2019 China Innovation Methods Competition will be held in Changsha, Hunan province, from Nov 18 to 24. 

More than 2,000 teams from over 1,000 enterprises across the country have taken part in the competition, with 200 advancing to the final.

They will be scored on the TRIZ-based methodology — from the Russian acronym for Theory of Inventive Problem Solving, an international system for guiding the creative process — they use in their research and development and other applications.

The 200 finalists will demonstrate their projects and be tested on their theoretical understanding, with the top 10 then competing on television in a similar fashion for the first, second and third prizes.

The event is being organized by the China Association for Science and Technology, the Ministry of Science and Technology and Hunan's provincial government.

"The 2019 competition aims to further stimulate the enthusiasm of scientific and technological workers in innovation, improve their ability to innovate, engage more people in innovation, and promote the application of methodical innovation on a larger scale to make innovation drive development," said Guo Hao, deputy director of the association's enterprise innovation service center.

He said the event is also an important embodiment of a guideline issued 11 years ago by the Ministry of Science and Technology, the National Development and Reform Commission, the Ministry of Education and the association aimed at promoting methodical innovation.

The first China Innovation Methods Competition was held in Hunan last year.

Guo said this year's competition had received more applications from a wider range of sectors and would have a greater social influence through its televised final. The number of finalists is up from 150 last year and Guo said the organizers has also formulated a more scientific and regulated competition agenda.

However, he said, only a fifth of the teams participating in the competition came from the country's small and medium-sized enterprises, which played a key role in innovation and development.

The organizers now plan to improve the competition's content and quality, mobilize more social resources and conduct in-depth research and field trips to learn what SMEs want and need from the competition so they can be given more support.