Transcript KIST Presentation - East Africa Internet Governance Forum

PROMOTING RESEARCH AND INNOVATION IN
ICT SECTOR
Presented by,
Dr. Santhi Kumaran, Associate Professor,
Dept. of CEIT , KIST
Email: [email protected]
RESEARCH AND INNOVATION
Research: Creative work undertaken on a systematic basis in
order to increase the stock of knowledge.
The term R&D covers three activities: basic research, applied
research and experimental development
Innovation: Invention and commercialization of new (or
betterment of existing) products, processes and/or services.
The “newness” need not necessarily involve “new” knowledge
thereby effectively implying that the “newness” may also
concern advancement or modification of existing knowledge.
RESEARCH
LEADS TO
•Science invents, industry adapts
and society conforms.
•S-curve/diffusion curve
•Cost-Effectiveness Research (CER)price control
INNOVATION
MODEL FOR GLOBAL INNOVATION
Indicator: Global Innovation index
Innovation inputs included government and fiscal policy, education
policy and the innovation environment.
Outputs included patents, technology transfer, other R&D results;
business performance, such as labor productivity and total shareholder
returns; and the impact of innovation on business migration and
economic growth.
UNIVERSITY EDUCATION LEADS TO
DEVELOPMENT
A good indicator of economic success could be how small or wide the
development gap is between an innovative research finding and the
translation of such finding into new products and industrial
processes.
 train and empower students to become critical thinkers;
 equip students with competency, skills and confidence required for
socio-economic development;
 promote
a culture for science, innovation and technoentrepreneurship
 build competence for specialization in key emerging technologies
 build human resource required for a potential future knowledge
economy.
 work with the industry to turn innovations and research outputs into
commercial products (commercialization of research outputs).
NEED FOR PARTNERSHIPS
(GLOBAL &LOCAL)
The benefits Research Partnerships include :
 Translating the research findings/innovations in to
commercial products
 Job creation
 Innovative training programs and courses
 facilitates the interchange of students and lectures
between different universities
 Additional funding source -government funding for basic
research in universities is not necessary in many cases
 Development of an effective research infrastructure with
local and international collaboration
ROLE OF KIST IN PROMOTING RESEARCH AND
INNOVATION IN THE ICT SECTOR
MIT-AITI training on Mobile applications development and
Entrepreneurship program to build innovative applications Hehe ltd
 Training on monitoring and evaluation of ICT projects
 EuroAfrica-ICT Research Initiative- EU FP7 project
 ITU- Regional Academy
 KOICA
training on mobile sensor networks and
programming
 World Wide Web Foundation –Entrepreneurship and
commercialization of innovations

CONTD…
 Global
Understanding Project with ECU and other
universities globally- to develop activities related with
academic, social and cultural formation and improves
the development of professional competences of
students
 Masters in Communication Management
 Masters in Operational Communication.
 Masters in Information Systems
 Masters in Software Engineering in collaboration with
East Carolina University-negotiation in process.
CONTD…
KIST journal of Science and Technology
 Promote Entrepreneurship training programs in all
faculties of KIST
 Directorate of Research publication and Consultancy in
place to promote Research
 Department of Technology Research and Innovation at
CITT to support Technological innovations among
Rwandan society.
 The
establishment of Technology and business
incubation units and KIST Enterprise Development Fund
(KEDF) at KIST to support young graduates.

COMPANIES IN TBIF INCUBATOR –
MIXED USE TECHNOLOGY INCUBATOR
RECOMMENDATIONS TO IMPROVE
INNOVATIVE RESEARCH








Increased partnerships with the business community to
turn innovations into commercial products.
A forum to encourage students and researchers to come
and present domestic research proposals and projects.
Source research funds especially for innovative research.
Strategic survey of R&D investment versus GDP is
required.
The development of strong R&D cooperation with countries
who are key players in ICT R&D.
The development of an effective research infrastructure
with local and international collaboration.
Measurement of Innovation Index which is a measure of
the innovation capacity at the county or regional level
Invite some of the world’s most innovative and successful
companies to Rwanda
CONCLUSION

Nowadays innovation isn't just a business fundamental, but a
patriotic duty. Rwanda’s vision being an ICT led socio economic
development ,its effective integration into the global economy
depends on successful research and innovations among higher
education institutions, private sector, development partners and other
relevant stakeholders.

At this point in this forum I should not fail to recognize “the
Internet” an important player of innovation, which has impacted
positively to produce good quality of research output and learning
leading to dynamic development .
THANK YOU