AIT Alumni 2024

Starting with a Swiss – South African approach, the program and its focus on initiating and strengthening collaboration in research and innovation has grown into a multinational venture involving Switzerland and South Africa, Rwanda, Nigeria, Kenya and Ghana.

Funded on the Swiss side by the State Secretariat for Education, Research and Innovation (SERI) since 2007 participating countries have been contributing in-cash and in-kind to the successful development of this program. Strong partners emerged as the Technology Innovation Agency (TIA) in South Africa, the Entrepreneurship Development in Higher Education (EDHE) of Universities South Africa (USAf), Ministries, Embassies, Universities, private sector stakeholders. They all have been contributing in an important way to take this program to the level at which we can enjoy it today.

2024 will give us the opportunity to celebrate 10+ years of joint university – entrepreneurship action. With start-up companies selected along these years and many of them operating successfully today we will dedicate the Year 2024 to the issue of company growth and address various aspects of it in webinars and on-site meetings.

On this page, you will find the announcement of our webinars as well as important dates for next year like the Annual AIT Swiss – Africa Conference end February 2024 in Nigeria and the AIT Swiss Africa Alumni Meeting in South Africa in November.

We look forward to a year of intensive discussion, experience sharing and growing awareness of how much knowledge is available in our own communities and our daily work.

Thursday 21^st September 2023, 14:30 – 15:00 CEST

Moderator: Mr. Erich Thaler

Speaker

Dr. Moses M. Kebalepile A medical data scientist and research coordinator at the University of the Witwatersrand, in the School of Clinical Medicine. He is also the Founder of a MedTech startup called KTI. Dr Moses graduated with a PhD in Public Health specialising in Computational Epidemiology.His academic research used Artificial Intelligence paradigms (Deep learning, particularly Artificial Neural networks) to study and predict asthma outcomes due to air pollution in the cities of Johannesburg and Tshwane. It was the unique algorithm from this doctoral research that he soft computed into a patented medical device called the Asthma Grid.

Webinar 2

On 5^th of October, a webinar with MLaw Mr Stephan A. Hofer will follow and address the important topic of international visibility of companies. How to set up international business infrastructure and to operate from abroad will be the questions that Mr Hofer will address.

Thursday 5^th of October 2023, 12:00 – 12:30 CEST

Moderator: Mr. Erich Thaler

Speaker

MLaw Mr. Stephan A. Hofer A lawyer from Switzerland, admitted to the Swiss and Bern Bar since 2013. Since his admission he worked as a legal practitioner for several companies in the financial sector in Geneva and Basel prior to joining business law firm GHR in 2016, where he was promoted to a partner in 2022. Mr. Hofer provides for legal advice in corporate law for Swiss and international SME’s and particularly focuses on restructurings. Furthermore, he is responsible for the privacy law division in the firm, providing legal advice for Swiss companies with special consideration of GDPR.Mr. Hofer heads the Africa Desk within the firm, wherein he cares to maintain cross-continental relationships with fellow lawyers all across Africa, as well as he is further responsible for relationships with Asian clients as well. Since this year, he is elected co-chair of the League of Lawyers, a network of independent law firms with the goal to connect legal practitioners from Asia and Europe.

Webinar 3

On 26^th of October the third webinar will take place. The speaker Mr Jordi Montserrat will talk about “How to connect to investors?”.

Thursday 26^th of October2023, 13:00 – 13:30 CEST

Moderator: Mr. Erich Thaler

Speaker

Mr Jordi Montserrat For the past 20 years, Jordi Montserrat has been active in the vibrant Swiss high-tech scene, contributing to the development of innovative businesses and stimulating the Swiss start-up ecosystem. He currently heads Venturelab Ldt, a Company supporting world class entrepreneurs and startups on their path to build successful ventures and fund raising, and is co-managing director of Venture Kick – a financing initiative supported by private donors. He also acts as business angel and board member in start-ups.

Webinar 4

The fourth webinar will be held on 16^th of November. The topic of this webinar will be “How to get your business investor ready?”. Ms Amne Suedi Kagasheki will give a presentation on this question.

Thursday 16^th of November 2023, 13:00 – 13:30 CEST

Moderator: Mr. Erich Thaler

Speaker

Ms Amne Suedi Kagasheki Managing Director Shikana Group Dar es Salaam, Tanzania President of the Swiss – Tanzanian Chamber of Commerce

All webinars are of 30 min. and are followed by a Q&A session.

A registration link will be sent out to all alumni companies in due time.

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