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The African Innovation Foundation (AIF) has opened applications for the sixth edition of the annual The Innovation Prize for Africa (IPA), which offers the continent’s top innovators a chance to share grand prize money of US$150,000.

The AIF said it is looking for enterprises and individuals that have invested in delivering market-oriented solutions for African-led development to take part in the competition.

Applications are open until January 3 for the awards, with the AIF inviting applications in social and economic innovation, including manufacturing and service industry, health and well-being, agriculture and agri-business, environment, energy and water, and ICT.

“We are extremely pleased to officially launch the IPA 2017 edition for African innovators. We strongly believe that investing in today’s home-grown innovations will propel tomorrow’s prosperity for Africa,” said IPA director Pauline Mujawamariya Koelbl.

Walter Fust, chairman of the AIF board, said the annual competition has demonstrated that African innovation talent is abundant, but funding and resources remain a challenge.  

“For IPA 2017, we are expanding our outreach beyond innovators to include investors and other key movers and shakers across the innovation landscape to help address this challenge,” he said.

“To meet this objective of increasing support to individual innovators, makers, training institutions, existing hubs and networks, the IPA will offer sponsorship opportunities to investors and other innovation enablers who can demonstrate their commitment to support the building of more robust African innovation ecosystems.”

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