Here are the top 10 nominees for the 2017 Innovation Prize for Africa and their inventions

The prize scheme revolves around competitiveness while supporting the culture of innovation and aiming for its growth despite Africa’s challenges.

2017’s edition of the Innovation Prize for Africa which is the 6th edition of the event and the Second Innovation Ecosystems Connector is being held in Accra Ghana.

After a rigorous validation process via an expert panel of judges, 10 nominees who went through a face-to-face pitching session were selected.

Here are the nominees for the 2017 Innovation Prize for Africa.

Peris Bosire

26-year-old Peris Bosire is a co-founder of FarmDrive. The Kenyan social entrepreneur’s FarmDrive is a financial technology company that has developed mobile phone applications collecting data for small scale farmers. The app also serves as an alternative risk assessment model.

Bosire has a First Class Honours Bachelor of Science degree in Computer Science and a winner of the 2016 Queen’s Young Leader Award and 2016 Commonwealth Youth Awards for Excellence in Development Work.

Gift Gana

Holder of a BSc (Hons) Applied Physics degree and from Zimbabwe, Gift is a tech entrepreneur and founder of the award winning tech company, Avelgood Apps.

Gift Gana’s Dr CADx for the 2017 Innovation Prize for Africa is a computer aided diagnostic system that helps doctors and health practitioners diagnose medical images more accurately.

Dougheh-Chris Nyan

The 53-year-old is a medical doctor and a biomedical research scientist and inventor from Liberia.

Dougbeh has developed a rapid test that detects a minimum of three to seven infections within 10 to 40 minutes. The test simultaneously differentiates the infections during the detection.

Aly El-Shafei

SEMAJIB is Professor Aly El-Shafei’s innovation. SEMAJIB fully read s Smart Electro-Mechanical Actuator Journal Integrated Bearing.

SEMAJIB is a smart bearing that can change its characteristics during operation. Its versatility is a point worth noting in the innovation of the Egyptian.

Omolabake Adenle

The best of voice recognition innovations struggle to recognize African accents. For Omolabake, making speaking, understanding and digitizing spoken African languages is what the Nigerian’s Voice Recognition and Speech Synthesis Software for African Languages is about.

Philippa Ngaju Makobore

Philippa’s Electronically Controlled Gravity Feed Infusion Set (ECGF) is designed to accurately administer intravenous (IV) fluids and drugs by controlling the rate of fluid flow based on feedback from drop sensors.

The Ugandan’s app has a safety feature with includes alarms for the rate of infusion whether rapid or slow.

Olanisun Olufemi Adewole

The Nigerian who has a postgraduate degree in Internal Medicine and Pulmonology from the Postgraduate Medical College Nigeria found a non-invasive and rapid diagnostic test to detect tuberculosis.

This is the Sweat TB Test.

Nzola Swasisa

Lokole is the name of Nzola’s innovation. This is a device that enables access to efficient email communication anywhere with cellular coverage at a very cheap prize.

The cost is one hundred to one thousand times cheaper that accessing email via a regular cellular bandwidth may cost you.

He is from the Democratic Republic of Congo.

Badr Iddrissi

Formerly a Microsoft Senior Account Executive, Badr is the CEO and Co-Founder of ATLAN Space.

His innovation, ATLAN Space develops software technology deployed to manage the operations of unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) or drones.

Nokwethu Khojane

The 39-year-old South African innovated Lakheni, a social and business model which seeks to aggregate low-income households into buying-groups in order to negotiate favourable discounts for goods and services supplied to the households.