Innovate Now, Africa’s first Assistive Technology Accelerator is seeking applications from innovators across the African continent who are dedicated to developing mobile-based technologies designed to assist people living with disabilities.

The UK Aid-funded programme, gets conducted by Global Disability Innovation (GDI) Hub and Amref Enterprises Limited, hopes to accelerate 12 start-ups in its second cohort, with a focus on solutions that will leverage mobile technologies to enable persons with disabilities access information and navigate daily life with independence and dignity.

The second intake’s theme – Mobile and Assistive Technology (AT) – is in response to research indicating that mobile technology can increase access to assistive technologies, information, digital products and services for people with disabilities.

This is especially true in Africa, a rapidly digitising economy where numerous basic services and products are available via mobile phone in countries such as Nigeria, Kenya, and South Africa.

“The mobile device and associated mobile technologies have tremendously improved access to information, goods and services for people from all walks of life, including persons with disabilities.

Innovate Now Cohort 2.0 aims to support ventures that are leveraging this disruptive technology to improve functioning, independence and wellbeing of persons with disabilities in Africa,’’ noted Bernard Chiira, Director – Innovate Now.

According to a study on mobile disability gaps published by the GSMA, mobile phone ownership among persons with disabilities is high, with approximately 82% of adults with disabilities in Kenya owning a mobile phone for example.

Although persons with disabilities are less likely to own a mobile phone than non-disabled persons, those with access to mobile devices perceive the handsets to be useful for accessing features such as education and financial services.

“The independence and wellbeing of persons with disabilities is critical. Assistive technologies are central to ensuring that persons with disabilities can continue to thrive.

It is my desire to see innovations supported by Innovate Now turn into big businesses that will not only make mobility easy, but create employment for our people,” said Senator Isaac Mwaura, Chair – Innovate Now Board.

Innovate Now is also inviting submissions for mobile technology-based innovations that seek to provide solutions to help persons with disabilities during times of crisis such as the COVID-19 pandemic.

Benefits of participation

• Selected finalists will participate in a rigorous 3-month virtual start-up acceleration programme that will run from July to September 2020
• Access to the Innovate Now Live-Lab Network where they can engage persons with disabilities in the product development process.
• Access to mentorship from experts such as Rhys Williams and Catherine Holloway from GDI Hub; Anne Lawi, Country Director – Pangea Accelerator; Maurice Otieno, Executive Director – Baraza Media Lab, and Robert Yawe, Managing Director – SynapTech Solutions, among others.
• Presenting their innovations to a select audience of investors and world leading institutions with the aim of scaling them to reach the populations that need them most.

Last year’s 5 finalists are preparing to pitch at the Innovate Now Virtual Demo Day to hold on June 4, 2020, during which various investments to get announced. They include:

• Vision Vijana
• Linccell Technology
• Hope Tech Plus
• Syna Consulting
• Toto SCI

Innovate Now is part of the AT2030 Programme. It is Africa’s first Assistive Technology Innovation Ecosystem and Start-up Accelerator and gets implemented by Amref Enterprises Limited (AEL) and led by the Global Disability Innovation Hub.

The Accelerator aims to support 60 start-ups, 15 of which will get scaled up over the next 3 years.

With statistics showing that close to 1 billion people globally do not have access to Assistive Technology and the gap is likely to double by 2050, the accelerator programme seeks to close the gap that exists between persons with disabilities and access to assistive technologies.

How to Apply

Interested start-ups with innovative ideas can go ahead to apply through this platform. The deadline for application is Monday, June 8, 2020.

The 2020 edition of the ITU Innovation Challenges will be taking place amid a global pandemic caused by Covid-19.

This has resulted in stress on value chains and countries’ readiness for a digital economy, significantly affecting social conditions worldwide.

Today, more than ever, we need digital innovation to help communities leverage technology to bridge the digital innovation divide and improve social conditions.

The ITU Innovation challenges bring together policy-makers, ecosystem builders, innovators, and resource partners to co-create ideas and projects that nurture an inclusive digital world.

There are three challenges to choose from:

• The Digital Change-maker Challenge covers a wide range of topics from cybersecurity and regulation, to digital inclusion and climate change, and calls for participants to provide innovative solutions to real-life problems faced by stakeholders in their communities, especially considering value chain competitiveness and global disruption due to COVID-19.
• The Ecosystem Best Practice Challenge looks for ecosystem builders to identify best practices that allow innovators to develop sustainable and resilient solutions to navigate technological change and bridge the digital divide.
• The Women in Tech Challenge, in cooperation with the EQUALS Global Partnership, invites tech innovators to help and empower women in various sectors, including agriculture, fashion, and health.

The winners will be announced in August 2020 and will be invited to a four-day immersive Global Innovation Forum in October 2020 where winners will participate in capacity-building workshops and pitch their proposals to a global audience of experts and network with decision makers.

Exceptionally, this year, we are looking at this forum as an online event due to the changing situation of Covid-19 (details to come).

At least 5 global winners will be selected per challenge by a jury of experts. Application criteria and guidelines are available here.

The application deadline is Friday, July 31, 2020. For more information about ITU innovation challenges, please visit here or send an email to Mohamed.Ba@itu.int.

Google is pleased to announce the third round of Google Africa Developer Scholarships, as part of our commitment to create skills and economic opportunities for Africa.

This builds on Google’s 5-year engagement to help bridge the developer skills and opportunities gap in Africa by providing 100,000 African developers with access to high-quality, world-class training on mobile technologies and Cloud platforms.

Today, Google has also announced an additional 30,000 training scholarship opportunities and a further 1,000 grants for the Google Associate Android Developer and Associate Cloud Engineer certifications.

The training will be delivered by our partners, Pluralsight and Andela, through an intensive curriculum designed to prepare learners for entry-level and intermediate roles as software developers.

Across Africa we continue to see developers who have successfully gone through the scholarship program grow their careers and also use their skills to benefit their communities.

Boutheina Bouchahda, a middle-school teacher from Tunisia, went through the training program last year and is building an application for her students to teach them how to program.

Boutheina credits the scholarship program for her skills and confidence growth. Ayeah Godlove Akoni from Cameroon completed the web development skills track and immediately got a job as a web developer.

He is also one of the 1,000 developers across Africa who qualified for the developer certification grants. .

Throughout this journey, we have seen the value of peer-to-peer learning as a catalyst for deeper learning thanks to the in-person meetups facilitated by our community leads in multiple cities across Africa.

Developers accepted into the scholarship will gain access to our network of over 250 Google Developer Groups and Developer Student Clubs in 150 cities across Africa.

This connection to communities focused on Google technologies will provide access to extra skills and help inspire the next generation of software developers in Africa.

Please click here to apply for the scholarship.