The fourth edition of the Kampala Innovation Week (KIW), an initiative of Startup Uganda and funded by the United Nations Capital Development Fund (UNCDF) kicked off this week at the MoTIV headquarters in Kampala.
The three-day virtual event that is running under the theme, “Recovery. Resilience. Innovation: Innovation and Entrepreneurship as a tool for the youth,” is aimed at achieving ways in which SMEs can recover from the COVID-19 pandemic and operate in a post covid economy.
While giving her opening remarks at the event launch, Uganda Communications Commission (UCC) managing director, Irene Kaggwa said that young people have the potential of coming up with various innovations but transforming these into workable solutions will need government’s hand.
She added that there is a lot of potential in Uganda and government needs to guide the young people and help them with research.
This year, the Kampala Innovation Week has attracted over fifty entrepreneurial speakers including Start Hub Africa’s Matthias Mobius, Mastercard Foundation’s Arnold Byarugaba, and Bump Love’s Manuela Mulondo, as well as investors.
The event highlights the ways in which various ecosystem stakeholders (ESOs, government, academic bodies and investors among others) can contribute to these recovery efforts and showcases entrepreneurs and startups already showing resilience and innovation when tackling the pandemic and its effects.
The three day event closes on Saturday with StartUp Uganda Awards including Startup of the year [ overall and by sector] and the Startup Champion of the year for the Corporate, public, Development sectors
KIW is one of the largest gathering of the startup ecosystem in Uganda and an innovation of StartUp Uganda, fifteen member organizations.
