Nosa Alekhuogie
The Nigeria Innovation Summit 2021, which held virtually with the theme: Charting a New Economic Path Through Technology, Innovation and Entrepreneurship, organised by Innovation Hub Africa, has received commendation by industry stakeholders for its huge success.
The summit in its 6th year, is an annual event that brings together stakeholders from different sectors of Nigeria’s economy to share ideas, trends, and opportunities around technology, innovation, and entrepreneurship development in Nigeria.
The three-day event was dedicated to promote innovation in all sectors of the economy in Nigeria.
Highlights of the summit included awards presentation and keynote sessions and presentations, showcase by startups, NiX talks, and panel discussions/interactive sessions.
Speakers at the summit include the Executive Vice Chairman of the Nigerian Communications Commission, Prof. Umar Garba Danbatta; Director-General of the National Information Technology Development Agency (NITDA), Mallam Kashifu Inuwa Abdullahi; CEO of IdentityPass, Lanre Ogungbe; Chair of the Board Nigeria-Canada Trade and Investment Group, Prof Tony Bailetti; Co-Founder, The Nest Technology Innovation Park, Oluwajoba Oloba; Director, Institute for Entrepreneurship and Development Studies (IFEDS), Obafemi Awolowo University (OAU), Prof. Isaac Abereijo, among others.
The Nigeria Innovation Summit Awards recognised and awarded key innovators at the forefront of the Nigerian Innovation landscape, as well as disruptors bringing positive and empirical impacts as well as progressive solutions to unique challenges.
Of the hundreds nominated for the Nigerian Innovation Awards 2021, only ten organisations and individuals emerged worthy recipients of this year’s awards, given their impressive track record to innovatively tackle problems and measurable impacts in keeping the Nigerian innovation landscape sustainable.
The 2021 NIAN awardees include Mallam Kashifu Inuwa Abdullahi for His Effort in Technology Development in Nigeria through NITDA; Sterling Bank Plc, for innovating consumer/retail banking with digital products; Obafemi Awolowo University (OAU), for pioneering and supporting startup development in Nigeria’s academic environment; The Nest Innovation Hub for supporting innovation in the tech and startup ecosystem; Kudabank, for innovating banking through digital bank; Chaka, for innovating retail investment opportunities for Nigerians. Others were Utiva, for innovating education through online learning; Helpmum, for Innovating maternal and infant health; Greenage Technologies, for innovating energy through indigenious smart solar inverters and Treepz, for innovating mass transport through bus-hailing.
Speaking on the summit and the Nigeria Innovation Awards, Programme Director of Nigeria Innovation Summit, Tony Ajah, said: “The submissions and recommendations from NIS 2021 proves that in this post-covid era, there is a need to build innovative business solutions, and develop an ecosystem in Nigeria across all sectors drive innovation by promoting local content development, and locally-relevant technological solutions.
Key stakeholders and innovation actors must have a decentralised collaborative platform to exchange ideas and mobilise the increasing knowledge of innovation to greatly impact on the socio-economic development of Nigeria so that local innovation can solve local issues. “This will improve performance across every sector of the economy. NITDA as an agency of government is poised to create opportunities for the development of homegrown technology solutions including the indigenous manufacture of competitive IT components, to meet the needs of the country, create jobs and wealth, compete globally and generate foreign exchange earnings. Other agencies of government are encouraged to emulate such initiatives.”
