Africa Tech Festival 2021 shortlist awards announced 

The Africa Tech Festival, a prestigious awards ceremony that recognises and awards innovations and innovators who are encouraging transformation, inclusivity and digital democracy across Africa, has announced its shortlist of awardees for 2021. 

Here are the shortlisted winners for the Africa Tech Festival 2021

The chosen winners will be announced during a virtual conference taking place later this month. In addition, winners are not selected by a panel of judges but instead by public casted votes, currently, voting is open until 3 November 2021. 

Running for 14 years, this year’s awards have created three new categories considering the latest developments in the tech ecosystem. These three new award categories include; the Fintech Innovation of the Year, Africa’s Green ICT Champion along with Africa’s Rising Star.

Sameh Sobhy, Managing Director – META Region, at communications service provider PCCW Global comments on their continued support of the awards. 

“As a founding sponsor of the Africa Tech Festival Awards, PCCW Global is delighted to once again support the virtual Awards ceremony and showcase excellence in African technology. We are particularly excited to champion leading organisations and individuals within the new categories for 2021 – Green ICT Champion, Fintech Innovation of the year and Africa’s Rising Star.”

The shortlisted nominees for 2021 Africa tech Festival Awards are:

Fintech Innovation of the Year

New for 2021, The Fintech Innovation of the Year Award recognises the organisation, project or individual who has disrupted the African Fintech space.

· ECOBBA AFRICA LTD

· OtangU- Eat Now Pay Later

· Interswitch Group

· Ericsson’s Wallet Platform

· Huawei’s support of M-Pesa Africa (Joint Venture between Safaricom and Vodacom) with FinTech Innovation

 Green ICT Champion

New for 2021, the Green ICT Champion of the Year Award will celebrate the individual or organisation leading on the development and integration of sustainable energy solutions.

· Jesse Forrester, CEO, Mazi Mobility

· Huawei’s Smart PUE Solution for Data Centers

· Ericsson

Building a Better, More Inclusive Digital World

This award recognises organisations and initiatives that have made a significant contribution to helping us build a more accessible and inclusive digital world.

· Africa Teen Geeks

· Yielding Accomplished African Women, Our Girls Our Future

· Ericsson and Unicef partnership to connect every school to the Internet by 2030

· Huawei Supports African ICT Skills and Talent Development with African Union Academy

· Parallel Wireless Urban Macro Open RAN Solution

Connectivity Project of the Year

This award celebrates the network providers and services going above and beyond to provide connectivity in an environment where demand has never been higher, and broadband has become a lifeline for access to education & economic activity.

· Mauritius Telecom

· ZTE Corporation – The world’s first Tri-RAT dynamic spectrum sharing solution SuperDSS

· Liquid Intelligent Technologies’ first East to West Fibre Link in Africa

CXO of the year

‘The CXO of the Year Award’ is back for 2021 – recognising the outstanding achievements of CEOs, CTOs, CIOs, CDOs and others in driving development within the African tech space.

· John Kamara. CEO, Adanian Labs

· Stephen Blewett, CEO, MTN Cameroon

· Sherry Singh, CEO Mauritius Telecom

· Robin Reetch, CEO, Kune Food

Female Innovator of the Year

It’s time to celebrate female achievement and contribution to technology, media & telecoms this year. This award will recognise the outstanding achievements of women who are playing a crucial role in African technology and telecommunications

· Sylvia Mukasa, Founder/CEO – GlobalX Investments Ltd/GlobalX Innovation Labs

· Sibongile Mongadi, Uku’hamba Prosthetics and Orthotics (Pty) Ltd

· Diana Wilson, CEO, Yielding Accomplished African Women

Most Innovative Product or Service

This Award recognises a game-changing product or service that has provided it’s target market with significant new opportunities for revenue growth or customer satisfaction.

· Bloow

· Decagon

· iSpace foundation

· MTN’s implementation of 5G digital operations

· Telkom SA & Huawei Build Africa’s Top1 VoLTE Commercial Network

· Mauritius Telecom& Huawei “my.t 360°” Digital Operation

· PCCW Global

Africa’s Rising Star

New for 2021, the Africa’s Rising Star Awards has been launched to celebrate the emerging talent in African tech – recognising and identifying future leaders and disruptors.

· Joy Mwangi, Ada Animation

· Arnold Nyendwa, CEO at VENTURAS JUMPSTART

· Ian Abraham, Head of Design, and Innovation at Kune Food

· Tobi Lafinhan, Co-Founder at Venture for Africa.

Read more: Social Entrepreneurship Impact Lab Programme applications open 

Featured image: Wan San Yip via Unsplash