University of Lagos (UNILAG), one of the best universities in Nigeria, is inviting its students to apply for the UNILAG Innovation Challenge.
The UNILAG Innovation Challenge is aimed at providing students with the opportunity to develop scalable innovative solutions for common societal challenges.
The UNILAG Innovation Challenge allows students to ideate about an identified national problem via working in a group, process the idea into a solution and then develop the solution to the business enterprise.
A major consideration in the challenge is the scalability of the process and technology charaterising the innovation.
For the 2020 UNILAG Innovation Challenge, the theme is about “Creating sustainable business enterprises through innovative recycling of polymeric materials towards achieving sustainable development goals particularly Goals 3, 9 and 12.”
Polymeric materials of all forms including tyres, plastic bottles and sachet-packs are often difficult to manage post-useful life.
The traditional practice of incineration releases poisonous gases to the atmosphere as well as contributing to global warming.
Additionally, oceans and coasts are now discharging points for these materials; at times, ending up in the belly of sea animals or clogging the drains which aggravate flooding with devastating consequences on livelihood.
Whereas waste management offers the opportunity to harvest inspiration and innovation in science, engineering, technology, IT and business as a powerful catalyst for economic growth.
Students have enormous potential for ideation in addition to passion. These attributes could be harnessed for providing creative innovative business ideas with the potential to scale and change the narrative of our socio-economic challenge.
This is what the UNILAG Innovation challenge seeks to accomplish.
Objectives
1.) Broadly, the challenge seeks to provide access to business solutions that address national challenges with the potential for high impact.
2.) It also seeks to inculcate in students the culture of a multidisciplinary approach to problem-solving with a view to enhancing their professional and social network mindset.
3.) It serves as a platform for sustainable creation of a pool of young entrepreneurs with multidisciplinary knowledge and skill in the business enterprise value chain.
4.) It will equally provide business community access to a wide range of ideas to enable them to scale quickly.
5.) It provides an opportunity for the University to improve the employability of its students whilst also contributing to the process of providing a solution to national challenges.
Procedure
a.) Students are to register in teams. So, students should form themselves into a team of 3-5 reflecting interdisciplinarity in composition.
b.) Teams are encouraged to maintain gender balance. Each team must have a staff adviser as coach or enabler.
c.) Register online at https://forms.gle/ypAo6tkrHbY4nW568
d.) Submit no more than a page concept note of the team’s solution idea @ unilagiptto@unilag.edu.ng
e.) Graphical illustration of the team’s solution idea is encouraged.
f.) The textual description must not be more than 500 words.
Selection Criteria
1.) Creativity – Bringing the “wow”/”imagination” factor to solving a problem
2.) Usability – Usefulness of the invention in solving a problem
3.) Technicality – The technology (simplicity, ease of operation and cost) used to create the solution
4.) Scalability – Potential for future upgrades to the invention to improve upon the solution
5.) Business value – Potential for commercialisation and return on investment and/or transnational value (export potential).
Timelines
* January 12, 2020 Challenge call opens for registration
*January 24, 2020: Deadline for registration and submission of the concept note.
*January 31, 2020: Announcement of selected student teams.
*February 5, 2020:
-Briefing of selected teams on the modalities for the Innovation Challenge.
-Innovators’ A-day contact with industry eco-system stakeholders.
*May 22, 2020: Teams to submit final solution design
*May 30, 2020: Pitching event.
