At the very least, asking people to generate app ideas as spec work (with a submission fee!) is worth it for the irony value.

I like the idea. I'm curious of what will be done in the four weeks. Is it pure coding or is it also R&D into the potential product's market? Will they be working on other client work in parallel or be fully dedicated to the selected product.

My point is that four weeks seems like a a lot of time to dedicate to a MVP. I've seen people bang one out in a weekend. With this kind of business proposal it would seem like a good idea to constrain the time spent on each proposal. As mgkismal suggested 1-2 weeks sounds like the sweet spot.

I don't think they will be able to hold up to their promise to provide "a comprehensive analysis of (...) potential costs, timeframe, and technical challenges". A rate of $100 per hour leaves them only 15 minutes per project review. And then there would be no money left to implement the MVP of the selected project.

mixed feelings on this. i applaud the idea, but not sure he'll get 200 idea submissions at $25/pop to make it worth the effort. You might get further with $100 one hour initial consultation with a short form report with a summary, observations, recommendations for that $100, then from those, every so often, choose the one you think you can add more value to, then offer a $5k or $10k 2 week "all hands" timeframe to build/execute everything possible. Not everything is possible in 2 weeks, but there's a heck of a lot that can be done in 2 weeks. If the idea/business guys/gals really are on the ball, and the idea's solid, they can take the results of that 1-2 weeks and run with it.

I have heard similar ideas in NYC lately. So many ideas and so few developers, its a huge opportunity cost to technical founders. However pushing the early stage business people to explain and flush out full their ideas before building something is always good.

NOTE: I am not connected to this firm, just thought the model was interesting.