Winners of first ‘ICT 4 Inclusion Challenge’ in Africa announced

Winners from Kenya, Nigeria and South Africa current their revolutionary answers for inclusive education

Paris, France – December three, 2021

The ICT 4 Inclusion Problem (ICT4IC) aims to shape inclusive education for folks with disabilities in Africa. The 3 winning teams were being presented with their awards nowadays all through the ceremony which took put virtually, livestreamed from Atos’ headquarters in Bezons and its offices in Munich. The competitiveness saw 202 programs with above four hundred individuals from 37 nations all-around the entire world compete.

The competitiveness was structured by Atos and the Deutsche Gesellschaft für Internationale Zusammenarbeit (GIZ) GmbH on behalf for German Federal Ministry for Financial Cooperation and Enhancement (BMZ) jointly with the Make-IT Alliance. Digital inclusion stands at the heart of Atos’ raison d’etre and materializes into Atos’ working experience portfolio, with certain answers helping folks with momentary or long term disabilities to operate without having barriers in the digital workplace.

The goal of the challenge is to establish digital improvements which are designed to improve access to education for all those with disabilities in Africa. The teams were being asked to post a digital or complex innovation (idea, mock-up or proof-of-notion (PoC)) that supplies or increases access to education for youngsters, youths and/or grown ups with disabilities in Africa. This could be a digital product or software digital assistive systems an idea to increase consciousness for inclusive education using digital systems and accessibility answers for on the internet studying environments.

Following an first initial spherical in which 10 teams were being selected by 24 judges to go to a two-week virtual bootcamp, the 9 industry experts powerful final jury panel, created up of Atos executives as perfectly as industry experts from GIZ, the private sector, civil society and global companies, selected 3 finalists. These are:

• one^st prize and competitiveness winner: ‘Vinsighte’, Nigeria

Vinsighte is a examining software package / software that helps make use of Synthetic Intelligence to help the visually impaired to go through conveniently. It is effective by scanning via texts on guides and examining the guides aloud to the visually impaired user. The staff won €6,five hundred.

• two^nd prize: ‘Virtual E&T’, South Africa

This tailored app supplies available and cost-effective Digital Schooling and Schooling Portal for folks with mental disabilities. The staff won €2,five hundred.

• three^rd prize: ‘Talking Charts’, Kenya

This answer addresses the accessibility challenges of data visualization for the folks with visual impairment and blind folks via artificial speech and car-captioning. The staff won €1,000.

Each participant in each individual of 3 winning teams was awarded a focused three-month mentorship program at Atos commencing in January 2022, as perfectly as financial prizes and an chance to pitch to be part of Atos Scaler, the Group’s accelerator program.

Commenting on these outcomes, Udo Littke, Head of Atos in Central Europe mentioned “Congratulations to our winners and to all of our contestants! I’m blown-away by the creativity and quality of the entries.Obtain to education is a single of the best barriers to inclusion for youngsters, younger people and grown ups with disabilities in Africa and digital improvements can assist to defeat this challenge by taking away barriers to education for people with disabilities. We’re quite happy to encourage the new generation to assist shape the inclusive education in Africa”.

The judging panel was carefully selected to present expertise in the fields of education, Data and Communication Technological innovation (ICT), innovation, accessibility, and incapacity inclusion as perfectly as regional African views. The competitiveness entrants needed to be long term inhabitants of an African state or non-inhabitants teaming up with an African firm, proving that their answer is not however easily out there on the market and encouraging that folks of disabilities are possibly part of the staff or provided into the item progress process.

To discover out much more, be sure to go to https://ict4inclusionchallenge.net/ .

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Photograph one: Oluwatomisin Kolawole from “Vinsights” Photograph two: Santie Terreblanche , Thomas Bezuidenhout, Taryn Du Toit, Mpilo Khumalo from “Digital E&T” and Photograph three: Eric Maina Wamugu from “Conversing Charts”

About Atos

Atos is a international chief in digital transformation with 107,000 staff and once-a-year earnings of above € 11 billion. European number a single in cybersecurity, cloud and high-functionality computing, the Group supplies tailor-made stop-to-stop answers for all industries in 71 nations. A pioneer in decarbonization expert services and merchandise, Atos is committed to a safe and decarbonized digital for its consumers. Atos is a SE (Societas Europaea), mentioned on Euronext Paris and provided in the CAC 40 ESG and Up coming twenty indexes.

The objective of Atos is to assist design the long term of the information and facts space. Its expertise and expert services help the progress of knowledge, education and investigation in a multicultural strategy and contribute to the progress of scientific and technological excellence. Throughout the entire world, the Group allows its customers and staff, and members of societies at significant to reside, operate and establish sustainably, in a safe and sound and safe information and facts space.

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Laura Fau | [email protected] | +33 6 73 64 04 18 | @laurajanefau