Four start-ups, Personal Watchguard, Ekraal Hub, H-Pass businesses, and Step-Hear – Assistive Accessibility Technology have been chosen to pilot their innovations at the Konza Technopolis in a bid to provide solutions for the residents and investors setting up at the smart city.
The start-ups, which emerged winners at the just concluded Konza Innovation Challenge 2021 will be seeking to provide various smart solutions for about 30,000 residents expected in the city.
Personal Watchguard, Ekraal Hub, and H-Pass businesses from Kenya are expected to pilot their innovations on intelligent asset management, smart parking management, and access management respectively.
The fourth startup from Israel, Step-Hear – Assistive Accessibility Technology will be offering its services on traffic management.
The Innovation Challenge was jointly hosted by the Konza Technopolis Development Authority (KoTDA) and the Embassy of Israel in Kenya.
The challenge, which attracted 99 nominations from Kenya and four from Israel sought to provide an opportunity for innovators in Kenya and Israel to solve the immediate and long-term needs of Konza Technopolis.
Speaking during the awards ceremony, ICT, Innovation and Youth Affairs Cabinet Secretary for Joe Mucheru lauded the efforts by the innovators, adding that piloting of the innovations at Konza City was a great milestone for the country as it will not only serve Konza but can be implemented in the rest of the country.
“This is an exciting and historic moment in the sector as we are accelerating development by having homegrown solutions to deal with our challenges. As a government, we are glad that today’s innovations will be piloted here at the Technopolis,” said CS Mucheru.
While urging the innovators to keep leveraging the tech space, CS Mucheru reiterated the government’s commitment towards creating an enabling innovation environment for startups to grow and thrive.
He noted that through government programs such as the National ICT Master Plan, the Constituency Innovation Hubs (CIHs), and the National Broad Band Policy, innovators can make use of the facilities and policies to develop more solutions for the country.
