South Africa’s Neo Hutiri wins Africa Prize for Engineering Innovation

Neo Hutiri, as South African engineer, has been selected as best of the best after ten years of the Africa Prize for Engineering Innovation, a statement from the organisers said.

Hutiri won the Africa Prize in 2019 and last night was awarded the Royal Academy of Engineering’s 10th anniversary medal, beating nine previous Africa Prize alumni from Nigeria, Kenya, Uganda, Ghana and Cameroon, according to the statement by Benjamin Harris, Director, Proof Communication Africa.

“The medal comes with more than a million rand (UK £50,000) to boost his business, Technovera, which makes Pelebox Smart Lockers to improve access to medication for chronic diseases, including tuberculosis and HIV,” the statement continued.

“The two runners-up for the medal were Aisha Raheem, with Farmz2u from Nigeria, a business that increases efficiency for market players in the food system through seamless operational systems, and Samuel Njiguna with Chura Limited from Kenya, with a web-based, multinetwork system that allows users to move airtime between their different SIMs regardless of carrier, buy airtime from service providers that can be used on any network, send airtime to family members or employees, or exchange airtime for cash. Both runners-up received £15,000 to further develop their innovations.”