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Nature 438, 281 (17 November 2005) | doi:10.1038/438281a; Published online 16 November 2005

Open Innovation Challenges

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Wisdom of the crowd

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Decision makers, wrestling with thorny choices, are tapping into the collective foresight of ordinary people. Jim Giles reports.

Like all of their rivals in the pharmaceutical industry, executives at Eli Lilly routinely need to make tough predictions. How much of a new product do they expect to sell?