From preparations all the way until the finishing drinks, the event was in every way a great success. No less than 59 idea suggestions were submitted in advance. Out of this great pool of ideas, a little more than a third (23) was selected and allowed to pitch at the event. The thought with Ideation Day is that rather new ideas should be further developed during the day and at the end of the day, a selection of them should receive some seed funding in order to be able to realize their goals. In order for the audience and fellow project owners to be able to give input to the projects the day started with 1-minute pitches of the 23 ideas by the project owners. Following this very brief introduction there was a series of workshops were everybody shared their knowledge and abilities in order for the projects to improve their pitches.

Although a majority of the projects were quite mature in that their goals and strategy well formulated most of the project owners got a lot of valuable input from the other participants, both when it comes to the projects themselves but mostly in the form of new and valuable contacts. The workshops truly became a sharing activity.

At the end of the day there was a marathon of 22 (two of the projects merged during the day) 3 minute pitches during which a team of judges kept scores. It was amazing to see how the quality of the presentations had improved during the previous workshops. Finally, the group of judges agreed on no less than 16 projects that were supported with either 5 000 or 10 000 Euro. There was also an audients favourite prize of 5 000 Euro awarded.

From Lund University Johanna Alkan Olsson was awarded 5 000 Euro for her project on algorithmic potato farming. The project will create a method for farmers to better handle outbreaks of late blight on crops, a disease expected to become more problematic in a changing climate. Also involved in the potato project are Veiko Lehsten from the Department of Physical Geography and Ecosystem Science, Lund University and Laura Grenville-Briggs from the Department of Plant Protection Biology, Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences (SLU).