Application Deadline: 25 July 2023 (4pm BST).
The Africa Prize for Engineering Innovation, founded by the Royal Academy of Engineering in 2014, is Africa’s biggest prize dedicated to developing African innovators, and assisting them to maximise their impact. It awards crucial commercialisation support to ambitious African innovators developing scalable engineering solutions to address local challenges, demonstrating the importance of engineering as an enabler of improved quality of life and economic development.
The Royal Academy of Engineering has opened applications for the 2024 Africa Prize for Engineering Innovation as the programme approaches its 10th anniversary. The Africa Prize supports ambitious entrepreneurs and innovators developing local and scalable solutions to everyday challenges on the continent.
The Africa Prize will welcome its tenth cohort in November 2023. Since 2014, the programme has supported more than 130 entrepreneurs across 20 African countries with a rigorous business training programme and lifelong support through the Africa Prize alumni network. More than 70% of the alumni’s engineering and technology businesses now generate revenue. Between them the Africa Prize alumni have raised more than USD 14 million in grants and equity funding, and created more than 3,600 jobs, almost half of them for women.
The Africa Prize is now looking for the next 16 promising innovators with engineering technologies to improve lives, launching applications today at the 10th Sankalp Africa Summit in Nairobi, Kenya – an event that showcases the entrepreneurial ecosystem working towards sustainable development in Africa.
Requirements
- African entrepreneurs from all engineering disciplines, and with an innovation that can provide scalable solutions to local challenges, are invited to enter the tenth round of the Africa Prize.
- Applications are now open to individuals or small teams living and working in sub-Saharan Africa.
- Submitted innovations should have a social, economic or environmental benefit, and should be at an early stage of development, with the potential for upscaling and commercialisation.
- The Prize is open to hardware and software innovations, as well as innovative processes and systems.
Benefits
- The winner of the Africa Prize receives £25,000 and three runners-up are each awarded £10,000.
- Up to 16 shortlisted applicants receive a unique package of support over eight months to help them accelerate their businesses, including comprehensive and tailored business training, sector specific engineering mentoring, communications support, pitching opportunities and access to the Academy’s network of high profile, experienced engineers and business experts in the UK and across Africa.
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