Building an innovation culture and ecosystem
Afretec is focused on supporting ICT entrepreneurs across the pan-African network of institutions — including current students, faculty and staff as well as recent graduates who might be continuing entrepreneurship activities started while a student. The support is focused on early stage entrepreneurs, from ideation through to a prototype minimum viable product, when they are ready to transfer to other later stage entrepreneurship support organizations, seek funding, or enter the market.
Anticipated outcomes
- Ensure any student, faculty or staff in an Afretec university can get started on their entrepreneurial journey
- Grow the capacity of each Afretec member to support a variety of types of early-stage entrepreneurs
- Support an Afretec-wide entrepreneurial ecosystem
Activity highlights
Annual Innovation Summit
Organized by CMU-Africa's Industry Innovation Lab, the Innovation Summit aims to equip students with the skills, tools, and connections necessary to create innovative solutions and address Africa’s pressing challenges. The summit creates an opportunity for collaboration between academia, industry, and government and fosters an ecosystem that empowers the youth to drive positive change across the continent.
In 2024, the summit convened a diverse cohort of 93 students, comprising 40 females and 53 males, representing 17 universities from African and American institutions, including French-speaking students.
The participating institutions included the University of Rwanda, Kepler University Rwanda, Carnegie Mellon University Africa, Carnegie Mellon University, African Leadership University, American University in Cairo, University of Nairobi, Strathmore University, University of Lagos, University of Yaounde, Addis Ababa Science and Technology University, University of Abomey-Calavi, University of the Witwatersrand, Makerere University, Rwanda Institute of Conservation Agriculture, and Uganda Management Institute.
Capacity building workshop series
In 2024, CMU-Africa's Industry Innovation Lab launched the first in a series of four workshops focused on capacity building in entrepreneurship. The five-day workshop took entrepreneurs through the entire product innovation process. This workshop equipped 50 young entrepreneurs and innovators from 12 African countries with a practical innovation process and a comprehensive set of tools to help them develop market-focused products and services.
Read more about the product innovation workshop
Tech skills marketplace program
University of Nairobi, University of Witwatersrand, and University of Lagos have each supported 25 student interns and 20 MSMEs through the program. American University of Cairo has supported 60 student interns and 40 MSMEs. CMU-Africa has supported 26 student interns and 22 tech MSMEs. In addition, the Industry Innovation Lab has placed 51 CMU-Africa students in 31 tech startups within five countries (Kenya, Rwanda, Ghana, Nigeria, and Uganda).
Entrepreneurship in action
Learn more about an Afretec startup, Student Paddy. A multi-university team of students from the University of Lagos and Al Akhawayn University created an online jobs platform for African students.