09Sep

Call for Applications: Bioscience Innovation Bootcamp

September 9, 2020 Ordia 26

BioInnovate Africa is a regional science and innovation-driven initiative, supported by Sida and implemented as a programme of the International Centre of Insect Physiology and Ecology (icipe). It operates in Burundi, Ethiopia, Kenya, Rwanda, Tanzania, and Uganda. We also collaborate with partners in South Sudan.

BioInnovate Africa enables scientists in Eastern Africa to develop and translate innovative bioscience research ideas, technologies and inventions into practical uses in society, which promote economic growth, create jobs, and reduce poverty. Thus, BioInnovate Africa fosters the development of a sustainable bioeconomy in the region by strengthening the capacity of scientists and institutions to link innovative ideas from the bench to business.

As part of the initiative, a 5-day bioscience innovation bootcamp has been organized for entrepreneurial scientists in eastern Africa to empower them to develop innovative and commercially viable biological-based ideas in areas including but not limited to;

Agroecology
Food and feed
Waste water treatment
Biopharmaceutical
Bioenergy
Biomaterials
Medical diagnostics
Green chemicals

Who is eligible to apply?

This call shall be limited to citizens and/or nationals of the seven (7) BioInnovate Africa participating countries attached to a university, research institution, private company, or other related organization (either as an employee or student).

How you will benefit

Access to Investors – Networking with investors & industry players at the 1st Regional Bioeconomy Conference.
Investment Readiness –Winners of the pitch event will get admission to a 3 months acceleration program by Villgro Kenya & BioInnovate Africa.
Fundraising – Increase your chances of being eligible for future BioInnovate Africa & Villgro Kenya funding and technical assistance.

Selection criteria

An innovative biobased idea with potential for commercial application (40 points)
A multidisciplinary team of three (3) members e.g. comprising of academia and industry/private sector (30 points).
At least 2 of the team members must be youth, i.e. within the age bracket of 15-35 years (10 points)
Technical proof of concept will be preferred over unproven ideas (20 points).

How to apply

Applicants are invited to submit the following as part of their application:

A support letter/email from your institution of affiliation (signed by e.g. the head of the department)
CVs of team members
A one-page personal motivation statement by the team leader
A PowerPoint application uploaded in this format using these guidelines

All applications will be uploaded through the online portal

Application deadline

The deadline for receiving applications is 5th October 2020 at 23:59hrs Nairobi Time. Late submissions will be disqualified.

Next Steps

Successful teams will be notified through email by 9th October 2020 Selected teams are expected to participate in the bootcamp for five days on 17-21 October 2020.

The teams will pitch their innovative ideas during the 1st Regional Bioeconomy Conference to be held on 22 October 2020.

For more information about the call, please contact:
Villgro Kenya
Email: ordia@villgrokenya.or.ke
and
BioInnovate Africa Programme Management Office (PMO)
Email: bioinnovate@icipe.org

Download the Bioscience Innovation Bootcamp Call for Applications

02Mar

Launch of the Innovators Forum at 7th Sankalp Africa Summit

March 2, 2020 Ordia 46

The session hosted by Villgro Kenya focused on building a vibrant community and ecosystem for medical devices and diagnostics innovation and manufacturing in the region.

26Feb

Innovators Forum – Harnessing the 4th Industrial Revolution(Hardware Innovations) to drive UHC in Africa

February 26, 2020 Ordia 38

The multisectoral event which will take place during the 7th Sankalp Africa Summit will bring together innovators, investors, enablers, entrepreneurs, health program administrators, policymakers and

28Jan

Leveraging Homegrown Angel Investors to Spur Growth of Innovations

January 28, 2020 Ordia 40

Villgro Kenya aims to impact not only innovative health start-ups but also grow the ecosystem in terms of growth in investments. In the second part of an interview with Paul Belknap, we gain insights on the need for more homegrown angel investments to catapult innovations within the ecosystem.

90% of capital injected into startups in East Africa comes from the West. While we have successful entrepreneurs within our borders they are wary to invest in start-ups and instead choose to invest in other sectors like real estate. This is majorly due to the lack of strong regulatory measures, unpredictable timelines and their traditional understanding of investment which makes investing in the innovations seem like throwing money into a hole.

Undoubtedly Kenya has been named as a frontier for innovations in Africa however, we still need to do more to show homegrown investors the value the world sees in innovation and convince them to put more money in the ecosystem to move the innovations to the next stage.

Q: Villgro Kenya has contributed to the health innovation ecosystem largely through its investments into early-stage companies and incubation programs. However, there is a gap in funding startups to scale, what can be done to mitigate this?

P: We can’t solve this problem by ourselves but one of the things that we saw in India was that there were so many more complementary sources of funding available for early-stage entrepreneurs. Government grants, angel investors and other grant funding/more investors with an early stage appetite, we need more of that.

One of the things Villgro Kenya has identified that we need to be able to fund startups to a greater extent in their journey than we needed to in India because there is a lack of complementary funding. On the order of $150k would help those companies move to the plate where they would start to match up with some of the investors that are more active in the ecosystem, some would come in the form of co-investment with early-stage investors as well.

Increasing our ability to fund companies and invest in companies is important but we can’t do it all by ourselves. If you look at things that Kenya & Uganda needs to work on, the government can play a role in terms of doing investments/grants into early-stage companies.

I don’t know that any government is great at investing in early-stage companies. The more successful ones have done a funds approach where they are allocated a set of resources and they pick management to do those investments for them.

There is a real need for more angel investment into startups in the ecosystem. Angel investment or the same individuals can consider investing in funds interested in tackling the pre-seed stage of funding under $150k- 500k.

I’ve talked to a few people who are frustrated with investors seeing real estate as the safe bet. Getting people excited into investing in entrepreneurship particularly the health sector seems to be lagging which is contributed by the fact that there have been very few successes in the health sector making people more cautious in investing into it.