The Innovation Challenge Hub
WHERE CLEANTECH ENTREPRENEURS MEET OPPORTUNITIES

What Will You Do Next?

Looking to develop, pilot, or scale your innovation? Take advantage of the myriad of opportunities provided by Innovation Challenges for which corporates, investors, accelerators, and governments are recruiting.

Cleantech Group helps innovators by sharing live (and expired) challenges that have captured our attention from our daily work engaging with the global cleantech ecosystem. The Innovation Challenge Hub is a useful resource to keep coming back to.

Cleantech Group is an active partner on these challenges:

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Innovation Challenges

You can search and filter through challenges by typing in the search field or by using the dropdowns below.

Click here to view past challenges.

  • Sectors

Shell GameChanger, Idea Village

Deadline: August 31, 2025
Coastal Innovation Challenge 2025

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Shell GameChanger and The Idea Village have joined forces to launch the Coastal Innovation Challenge 2025.

This call for solutions invites founders developing innovative technologies to support coastal restoration, sustainable coastal construction, and marine biodiversity. With the Gulf South’s unique ecosystems and economy closely tied to coastal health, this initiative is an opportunity to unlock scalable solutions that strengthen natural infrastructure and support long-term environmental resilience.

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Victorian Water Minister

Deadline: December 31, 2025
Water to drive innovation, adaptation and collaboration on key climate challenges
The Challenge is an annual competition for all Victoria, Aus...

The Challenge is an annual competition for all Victoria, Australia, water corporations and provides a structured way to drive innovation, adaptation and collaboration on key climate challenges facing the sector. The Challenge will incentivize individual water corporations to explore and invest in climate innovation while continuing to deliver essential water services to Victorians.

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The California Governor’s Office of Business and Economic Development (GO-Biz)

Deadline: February 26, 2026
CleanTech in the Nordics Export Training
The California Governor’s Office of Business and Economic De...

The California Governor’s Office of Business and Economic Development (GO-Biz) invites California small businesses to register their interest in export training targeting clean technology for Denmark, Norway, and Sweden.

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International Solar Alliance

Ongoing
SolarX Startup Challenge 2025
SolarX Startup Challenge aims to crowdsource implementable, ...

SolarX Startup Challenge aims to crowdsource implementable, cost-effective, scalable and innovative solutions to some of the persistent challenges faced by the solar energy sector. The aim is to promote innovation and discover local solutions, with the overarching objective of capacity-building of stakeholders across the globe.

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Sustainable Ventures

Ongoing
Innovation Challenge: Lambeth
Sustainable Ventures is launching a competition to help SMES...

Sustainable Ventures is launching a competition to help SMES & Established Businesses solve their net zero challenges and Innovators scale their solutions particularly in low carbon buildings, waste management, behavior change, and low carbon mobility.

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Imagine H2O Asia

Ongoing
Pilot Funding & Scale Up Support
Asia-Pacific water challenges that are addressed by entrepre...

Asia-Pacific water challenges that are addressed by entrepreneurs receive pilot funding and scale up support with partners.

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Plug-and-Play

Ongoing
Mobility Accelerator
Autonomous vehicles, connectivity, electrification, smart ci...

Autonomous vehicles, connectivity, electrification, smart cities.

Rolling applications year round. Stage-agnostic.

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EcoLabs

Ongoing
EcoLabs-Continental Urban Mobility Accelerator
Spanning urban mobility, electrification, energy efficiency,...

Spanning urban mobility, electrification, energy efficiency, and sustainable transport.

Open to applicants in all regions/continents.

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EVA

Ongoing
Electric Vehicle Accelerator
Charging infrastructure, EV fleets, services supporting elec...

Charging infrastructure, EV fleets, services supporting electric mobility.

Announced in April 2022. Open to companies located beyond Singapore.

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Get our Guides to Successful Innovation and Put Your Company Ahead of the Rest

Fast Guide to Successful Innovation Part One: How to Smash the Innovation Challenge Application

How much information should you share? What's essential? Optional? Part One of our Fast Guide to Successful Innovation zeroes in on what you need to do to connect with the decision makers in all the right ways.

Get the Guide

Fast Guide to Successful Innovation Part Two: Pitching a Cleantech Company - Your Checklist for Success

Selling your idea or product to new audience can be as daunting as it is exciting. Our checklist takes you through a plan for getting the the best possible outcome.

Get the Guide

Fast Guide to Successful Innovation Part Three: How to Get the Most from your Corporate Cleantech Partner

Understanding your potential new partner's requirements, and even their language, will help you benefit from the process, manage your feedback and respond with useful information.

Get the Guide

Insights to Support Your Progress

08/06/2025

Generating Carbon Offsets in Carbon Farming

Soil carbon and carbon farming deal with organic carbon that is present or stored in soil.  It occurs when animals and plants that have die...

By Zainab Gilani

About Cleantech Group

At Cleantech Group, we provide research, consulting and events to catalyze opportunities for sustainable growth powered by innovation. We bring clients access to the trends, companies and people shaping the future and the customized advice and support businesses need to engage external innovation.

Industries are undergoing definitive transitions toward a more digitized, de-carbonized and resource-efficient industrial future. At every stage from initial strategy to final deals, our services bring corporate change makers, investors, governments and stakeholders from across the ecosystem, the support they need to thrive in this fast-arriving and uncertain future.

The company was established in 2002 and is headquartered in San Francisco with with offices in Asia, Europe and North America.

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