DSN PhD4Innovation hub is focused on supporting PhD/MSc research works that solve social/business problems through a tripartite model that brings together rigorous academic research, industry R&D support and incubation support for Ideas development and techpreneurship.
The technology ecosystem requires a tripartite engagement between the industry, academia and the developers’ ecosystem in order to create insightful breakthroughs that leverage rigorous academic research to solve industrial and social problems. A technology ecosystem that is not rooted in robust intellectual academic research may be short-sighted and unsustainable, hence a need to learn from the successful models like the Stanford/Silicon Valley business model and the Cambridge Innovation ecosystem.
The current growth in tech ecosystems is not well aligned with local research contributions from Nigerian universities, especially in areas that provide huge opportunity for socio-economic leapfrogging (e.g. artificial intelligence, machine learning, etc.). Many ideas being promoted in the developers’ ecosystem today are not serving the fundamental peculiarities of our nation, and there remains a penchant for copying the developed world. For example, if we have more featurephones in the low income segment of society, why is there no research on what can be done to deliver on-demand services via unstructured supplementary service data (USSD) instead of applications? It appears that our current developmental efforts are not underpinned by the robust, research-led identification of problems and their requisite scientific exploration, which are precursor to truly innovative local solutions.
The hub’s focus is therefore on how to use using data to answer local problems and drive digital inclusion and achievement of Millennium Development Goals.
A platform where you can partner, sponsor and collaborate with academic talents (lecturers and students) who have industry-relevant academic research
A platform on which investors can identify ideas to invest in and incubate technical and commercial readiness.
A platform where you can recruit talents for strategic R&D projects and innovations
A platform where you can easily share ideas about business problems or gaps where research and solution development is expected, and a strong focus on the use of advanced analytics, artificial intelligence etc.
A platform that hosts and manages innovation sandboxes for business-oriented ideas that encourages idea experimentation and concept validation from the academic/developer ecosystems
A platform where you can partner, sponsor and collaborate with academic talents (lecturers and students) who have industry-relevant academic research
A platform through which to showcase planned and ongoing research works and innovations that have commercial relevance
A platform on which to access industry data, support and bench-test research works that require real world testing or validation
A platform to disseminate knowledge dissemination of research breakthroughs
A platform on which to access industry data, support and bench-test research works that require real world testing or validation
A platform to disseminate knowledge dissemination of research breakthroughs
Propositions for would-be research-to-innovator PhD/MSc techpreneurs
The programme is managed by expert academic researchers (in Nigeria and abroad), incubator experts, industry R&D gurus, global innovation leaders, and backed by investors who are committed to developing high-impact, medium-to-long term transformational solutions.
