Prizes versus Contracts as Incentives for Innovation
研究了在研发努力不可验证且实施成本为私人信息时，如何通过现金奖金和后续合同两种工具来最优地激励创新，并发现合同是主要激励手段，奖金仅在高价值创新时作为补充。
Abstract Procuring an innovation involves motivating a research effort to generate a new idea and then implementing that idea efficiently. If research efforts are unverifiable and implementation costs are private information, a trade-off arises between the two objectives. The optimal mechanism resolves the trade-off via two instruments: a cash prize and a follow-on contract. It primarily uses the latter, by favouring the innovator at the implementation stage when the value of the innovation is above a certain threshold and handicapping the innovator when the value of the innovation is below that threshold. A cash prize is employed as a supplementary incentive only when the value of innovation is sufficiently high. These features are consistent with current practices in the procurement of innovation and the management of unsolicited proposals.