Open AIR Students Present at Carleton’s Institute of African Studies

Back in October 2016, three of our Open AIR Research Fellows had the unique and rewarding opportunity to participate in the Second Annual Institute of African Studies Undergraduate Research Conference at Carleton University’s Institute of African Studies. Undergraduate researchers from across the globe presented their research findings on a wide breadth of topics – from fiction describing Nigerian culture, to professional development for youth in South Africa, to political structures that influenced the welfare state in Tanzania and Kenya.

Open AIR at TFi4SD Africa

By Erika Kraemer-Mbula The 2018 Annual Economic Summit, was organised by the Global Economic Institute in partnership with the Government of the Canary Islands. It...

The Open African Innovation Research Partnership Transition Workshop

By Dana Elbashbishy On the 8th of February 2018, members of the Open African Innovation Research Partnership (Open AIR) gathered in Accra, Ghana to share research...

Open AIR Awarded CAD 750,000 to Transform Artificial Intelligence Related Intellectual...

Researchers from the Open African Innovation Research (Open AIR) network have been awarded almost CAD 750,000 for a new three-year research project, Catalyzing AI’s Potential in Africa...

WIPO 33rd IGC Session Puts Traditional Cultural Expressions (TCEs) on the...

The WIPO-IGC recently commenced the next installment of its deliberations for a text-based instrument that focuses on the protection of traditional cultural expressions (TCEs), pursuant to its mandate. There are two scheduled forums on TCEs beginning Feb 27-March 3 and to be completed in June 2017, which will round off the Committee’s work for the 2016-17 biennium.

Strengthening Canada-Africa Relations: What Way Forward?

By Jeremy de Beer and Yvonne Ndelle The recent conference hosted by the Canada Africa Parliamentary Association (CAAF) served as a pivotal platform for discussing...

El Houssamy Presents at Egypt Entrepreneurship Summit

The Summit was part of a series of events that took place in Egypt in conjunction with the Global Entrepreneurship Week. A2K4D’s Senior Research Officer, Nagham El Houssamy, participated in the summit, speaking on the Data-Driven Innovation Panel on Friday, November 18.

How Designing Crops for Global Food Security and Open AIR are...

By Meghan Blom Open AIR aims to understand how open collaborative innovation can help businesses scale up and seize the opportunities of the global knowledge economy....

Common Misconceptions of Patents in Egypt

Earlier this year, the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO) held a two-day workshop on “Supporting Small and Medium-Sized Enterprises Use the Intellectual Property System in Their Competitive Strategy” at the Academy of Scientific Research and Technology in Cairo, Egypt, which some of our Open AIR NERG members attended. The goal of this meeting was to discuss how to encourage young innovators to protect their inventions by patenting them at the Egyptian Patent Office. The workshop had vibrant and sometimes heated discussions between these innovators and government officials regarding many of the obstacles faced in the patenting process in Egypt.

Beating the Odds: NERG Virtual Brownbag Presentations Kick-Off

The Open AIR New Emerging Researchers Group (NERG), under the leadership of Esther Ekong and Adel Osama, organized a virtual meet-up series, which kicked...