The Qualcomm Tricorder XPRIZE was an inducement prize contest, that originally offered a US$7 million grand prize, US$2 million second prize, and US$1 million third prize to the best among the finalists offering an automatic non-invasive health diagnostics system in a single portable package that weighs no more than 5 pounds, able to autonomously diagnose 13 medical conditions, including anemia, atrial fibrillation, Chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, diabetes, leukocytosis, pneumonia, otitis media, sleep apnea, and urinary tract infection. The winning devices must also be able to continuously record and stream the 5 main vital signs: blood pressure, heart rate, oxygen saturation, respiratory rate and temperature. The name is taken from the tricorder device from the science fiction TV series Star Trek which can be used to instantly diagnose ailments. The prize was initially announced by the X PRIZE Foundation on 10 May 2011 and subsequently launched on 10 January 2012 at CES 2012. Devices were sent to the University of California San Diego to be independently tested on patients during the winter and spring of 2015, and again in late 2016 at the Altman Clinical and Translational Research Institute at UCSD. Although no team successfully met all the requirements of the grand prize, the competition was concluded in April 2017 when the XPRIZE Foundation awarded reduced prizes to the strongest performing teams. Most notably, Final Frontier Medical Devices was awarded US$2.6 million and Dynamical Biomarkers won US$1 million. A third team, Cloud DX, was named "Bold Epic Innovator" and awarded US$100,000 for achieving the main milestones of the competition while missing a crucial deadline. Earlier in 2016, some of the funds from the original prize purse were awarded to semi-finalist teams for hitting technology milestones. For the first time at any XPRIZE, the leftover funds from the main prize purse have been earmarked for further development, consumer testing and commercialization of tricorder prototypes for the two finalists and four semi-finalist teams as part of the Post Prize Initiative.
Advanced to final round
The two teams to compete in consumer testing round:
SCANurse - Team from medical company SCANurse, led by Anil Vaidya.
Zensor - Team from medical company Intelesens, led by Jim McLaughlin.
Conclusion of the Prize
In the end no team met all the requirements needed to win the full prize purse for an automatic non-invasive health diagnostics system packaged into a single portable device. In April 2017 X PRIZE Foundation made the following awards for a total of $3.7 million:
$2.6 million to Final Frontier Medical Devices as the highest performing team
$1 million to Dynamical Biomarkers Group for second place
$100,000 to Cloud DX as the first Bold Epic Innovator, "in recognition of exponential technological progress in the field of consumer-focused medical technologies, and potential for expanding access to healthcare when deployed at scale".
The rest of the original $10 million prize purse was diverted to ongoing consumer testing to get tricorder technology into the hands of patients and adapting tricorders for use in hospitals in developing countries.
