Global Innovation Week has started, 15 innovators have gathered in Accra to learn & share

Last September we launched our third Global Innovation Competition to find the best tech4gov ideas emerging across Africa and Asia. 

We got hundreds of proposals from techies, civil society groups, businesses and ordinary people – and more than 30,000 public votes helped us decide who got through to the finals.

One of a kind

This week, our 15 finalists are meeting in Ghana to work together, to challenge each other, and to pitch their ideas to a panel of experts.

The finalists’ week is one of a kind. Last year, we saw global organisations like LexisNexis working on legal services in Kenya sit down with two students working from their shared flat to build a disaster response platform in the Philippines.

Nowhere else are conversations like these happening.

The GIC is not just a competition. It’s a collaboration.

The GIC can be an example for others

The competition is part of our program’s broader approach to finding and funding innovations. As Declan Ottaro, Innovation Coordinator puts it:

“It has given us ideas and solutions from unusual suspects that will change the world. Ideas and solutions that otherwise never would have reached us.”

Follow the week on twitter @allvoicescount #GIC2016