The Royal Academy of Engineering has shortlisted 16 innovators for the 2026 Africa Prize for Engineering Innovation. The Africa Prize, which is part funded by the United Kingdom’s Department for Science, Innovation and Technology, is the continent’s largest prize dedicated to stimulating, celebrating and rewarding engineering innovation and entrepreneurship across sub-Saharan Africa. The innovators will enter an eight-month programme of training, mentoring and networking opportunities ahead of the final in October 2026.
This year’s shortlist features innovators located across 11 African countries, with products ranging from AI-powered mobile dialysis technologies to digital education for coding skills and smart public transport platforms. Other innovations include solutions to sustainability challenges such as renewable energy systems for off-grid communities and hospitals, smart agritech platforms, low-cost clean water supplies and waste management systems.
Rebecca Enonchong FREng, chair of the Africa Prize judging panel, said: “It’s incredibly rewarding to welcome talented innovators from so many different countries into the Africa Prize community this year. The 2026 shortlist is representative of the diverse range of local engineering solutions and businesses that are developing across the continent, and their ability to address crucial challenges in healthcare, education, transport and sustainability. We look forward to supporting these entrepreneurs to scale up their impact and benefit local communities.”
Elly Savatia, winner of the Africa Prize in 2025 with his groundbreaking sign language app, Terp 360, said: “Winning the Africa Prize last year marked a major milestone for us at Signvrse. Through the APEI programme, we strengthened both the engineering behind Terp360 and the business behind our work, developing a robust, investor-ready business model while refining our technology roadmap. The prize also connected us with partners and advisors who helped us build the infrastructure needed to make communication accessible for diverse deaf communities.”
Shortlisted innovations from Ghana, Kenya, Lesotho, Malawi, Niger, Nigeria, Rwanda, Senegal, South Africa, Tanzania, and Zambia have each been selected for their solutions to critical environmental, educational and health challenges in their communities.
• Fusion Wind Turbine, created by Johannes Amo-Aye in Ghana, is a hybrid wind and solar microgrid system that delivers reliable, clean electricity to off-grid communities, and supports and reduces reliance on diesel generators.
• Automated Vermicomposting Device by Royford Mutegi from Kenya is a solar-powered solution that converts food waste into pest-resistant fertiliser pellets, enabling smallholder farmers to restore soils and reduce reliance on imported chemical fertilisers.
• Farmflex is an AI-enabled smart farming platform by Mochesane Mpali in Lesotho, helping African smallholders to grow more food with less water, reduce risk and gain direct access to credit, insurance and new markets.
• Malawi Drop by Tadala Mtimuni from Malawi is a low-cost, refillable household water treatment device delivering safe drinking water at the point of use for off-grid rural communities, removing the need for complex manual dosing.
• Likita Care, created by Mamane Kabirou in Niger, is a locally manufactured monitoring kit for hospitals and clinics, combining vital signs, cardiac, and prenatal monitoring with offline AI decision support and digital protocols to improve triage and patient safety.
• Efiwe, developed by Chidi Nwaogu in Nigeria, is a mobile-first coding platform that runs offline on basic smartphones, enabling young people excluded from traditional digital education to learn web development with AI support in 189 languages.
• Just Add Water by Derick Nwasor from Nigeria is a quantum and AI-optimised regenerative fuel cell technology, providing clean energy and medical-grade oxygen to healthcare facilities, reducing dependence on fossil fuels and third-party oxygen delivery.
• HarakaPlus is a smart mobility platform created by Millicent Kariuki in Rwanda that provides live bus location and passenger-demand data, helping commuters and transport operators to make public transport more reliable across African cities.
• Peecycling is a solution by Dyllon Randall in South Africa, transforming human urine into safe liquid fertiliser and reusable water, helping cities to conserve water and reduce dependence on imported fertilisers.
• LabZero is a virtual tissue culture lab designed by Sincengile Ntshingila in South Africa that enables students to practise growing and maintaining cells safely on a digital platform, reducing contamination, cutting plastic waste, and widening access to biomedical research training.
• Jangalma, created by Moustapha Diop in Senegal, is an AI-powered education platform providing affordable, personalised learning and tutoring to secondary school students across Francophone Africa, regardless of income, location or connectivity.
• ZaidiApp by Allen Kimambo from Tanzania is an eco-fintech platform helping cities to digitise waste collection, formalise informal recycling work, and unlock financial services for waste workers and contractors.
• WaterBank, developed by Faith Kuya in Tanzania, is a solar-powered, self-running water utility that filters and desalinates water, uses AI to prevent breakdowns, and enables cashless access via prepaid radio frequency ID cards for off-grid communities.
Shortlisted innovators will take part in an eight-month training programme focused on core business skills, including financial management and market analysis, to help them develop their ideas into market-ready ventures. As part of the prize, they will also receive expert business, technical and sector-specific engineering mentoring, alongside access to the Academy’s extensive network of engineers and business leaders across the United Kingdom and Africa.
The programme’s panel of judges will then select four finalists who will pitch to win the 2026 Africa Prize at a live final event in Johannesburg in October. The winner of the Africa Prize will receive £5000, while the three runners up will each be awarded £10 000. The audience will then select the winner of this year’s One-to-Watch award for the most impactful pitch, worth £5000. All shortlisted candidates will join the Africa Prize alumni community of more than 160 innovators, gaining access to exclusive opportunities for funding, development and ongoing support. Since 2014, the alumni have introduced nearly 700 products and services to the market in more than 40 countries across five continents, and developed solutions linked to each of the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals on a local level.
For more information contact Sofia Costa Navarro, The Wilful Group, sofia.navarro@thewilful.com, www.thewilful.com
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