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All content in this area was uploaded by Love Ekenberg on Oct 26, 2016
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EJISDC (2016) 73, 1, 1-23
The Electronic Journal of Information Systems in Developing Countries
www.ejisdc.org
1
FACTORS IMPACTING ON THE CURRENT LEVEL OF OPEN INNOVATION AND
ICT ENTREPRENEURSHIP IN AFRICA
Paul M Cunningham
IIMC / IST-Africa / DSV,
Stockholm University
paul@iimg.com
Miriam Cunningham
IIMC / IST-Africa / DSV,
Stockholm University
miriam@iimg.com
Love Ekenberg
DSV, Stockholm
University / IIASA
lovek@dsv.su.se
ABSTRACT: Across Africa, Innovation and ICT entrepreneurship are increasingly
recognised as important enablers of national and regional socio-economic growth.
However, the level of skills capacity, indigenous entrepreneurial expertise and policy
support varies considerably. This research study was informed by a semi-structured,
moderated focus group involving five public and four education and research stakeholders
from eight African Member States. It focused on identifying factors impacting on the
current level of open innovation and ICT entrepreneurship in Africa. Organised in
Lilongwe, Malawi on 08 May 2015 during IST-Africa Week 2015, a purposive approach
was applied to identify the nine informants based on intensity sampling. The results
highlighted six main factors: a) level of political will reflected by resource prioritisation; b)
alignment with national development plans and associated funding priorities; c) level of
understanding of strategic benefits by ministers and senior civil servants; d) level of
awareness and sensitization of the general public, e) availability of national innovation and
entrepreneurial expertise; and f) willingness and capacity to cooperate with other
stakeholders to achieve common goals. Future research will capture perspectives from the
private, societal and international donor sectors, and create and validate potential
models/methodologies to address the challenges and opportunities identified in this study.
Keywords: Open Innovation, ICT Entrepreneurship, Africa, Multi-Stakeholder
Cooperation
1. INTRODUCTION
Innovation and ICT entrepeneurship are slowly being recognised as important enablers of
socio-economic growth and realising national strategic goals (e.g. Vision 2030 Namibia,
Vision 2030 Kenya, Vision 2020 Malawi) in African Member States. However, traditionally
innovation ecosytems in Africa tend to be quite fragmented (Cunningham et al., 2014) and the
policy and practical mechanisms to support the take up of Open Innovation and ICT
entrepreneurship varies significantly from country to country.
Venkataraman (1997) suggests that the scholarly field of entrepreneurship aims to
understand the creation, exploitation and impact of innovative products and services.
Referencing various models of entrepreneurship in developing countries proposed by
Osterwalder, Rossi and Dong (2002), Lingelbach et al. (2005), Vivarelli (2012) and IEG
(2013), Cunningham et al. (2014) highlight that these models do not adequately address the
need for adaptation to address local, national and regional differences. In a recent study
focused on ICT-related collaboration and innovation capacity in Dar es Salaam, Kampala and
Nairobi, Cunningham et al. (2015b) notes the imperative (while acknowledging the strategic
challenges) of building an innovation and entrepreneurial culture that leverages contributions,
insight and resources from all relevant stakeholder groups, both foreign and domestic.
OECD (2005) defines innovation as the implementation of a new or improved product,
service, process, marketing method or organisational method for business, the workplace or
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external relations. In a developmental context, this researcher adapts the OECD definition,
defining innovation as improving products, services, processes, business models or policies in
an existing context or adapting them from one context to another to achieve desired impact.
This researcher defines adaptation as necessary changes required to achieve desired outcomes
based on the needs of target end-user communities. These can be measured through Return on
Investment (ROI), Return on Objective (ROO) and/or increased engagement or productivity.
Chesbrough (2003a, 2003b, 2006) defines open innovation as the use of “purposive
inflows and outflows of knowledge” to accelerate internal innovation, and expand markets for
external use of innovation. There is a rich and long standing research literature focused on
Innovation. Chesbrough et al. (2006) credit Schumpeter with stimulating the study of
innovation: Schumpeter (1934) which compared entrepreneurs with established companies;
and Schumpeter (1942) which acknowledged the growing influence of private sector research
on the innovation process. This has influenced the study of innovation since that time, with a
very strong focus (particularly in the US) on private sector innovation.
Enkel et al. (2009) acknowledge the relevance of open innovation in commercial
research. In the context of addressing developing country contexts, Cunningham, et al.
(2015a) provide a brief summary of research focused on open innovation, national innovation
systems and the benefits of taking a multi-stakeholder approach towards co-design.
Cunningham et al. (2014) argue that globalisation and technology and social
innovation has expanded the universe of contributing innovation stakeholders. This should
include public, private, education and research, societal, international development and
funding organisations, as well as end-user communities and innovation spaces inside and
outside national borders. The African Union Commission (2014) also acknowledges the
important contribution of collaborative innovation and entrepreneurship to Africa’s socio-
economic development.
This strategic importance of Innovation and Entrepreneurship is also recognized by
Priority Area 3: Human Development, of the Joint Africa-EU Strategy (JAES) Roadmap 2014
– 2017, agreed at the 4th EU-Africa Summit. Section 30 emphasizes the importance of
reinforcing cooperation between research communities, creating joint research programmes
focused on innovation and the productive sector including research infrastructures. Section 31
commits to developing a long-term, jointly funded and managed research and innovation
partnership. It recognizes the cross-cutting contribution of innovation, entrepreneurship,
research infrastructures and technical skills development in Africa and Europe.
Despite this policy level recognition of the strategic importance of innovation and
entrepreneurship for developing countries, as already noted, most research in these domains
has focused on the economic and technology adoption context of developed countries.
Reichman (2005) makes the important point that it is not possible to transplant open
innovation models (such as between industry and the education and research sector) into a
developing country environment without modification. Scheel and Parada (2008) reinforce
this concept, by suggesting that the innovation value chain is significantly different in
developed countries compared to developing countries.
This emphasises the importance of literature addressing innovation and
entrepreneurship in developing countries. Much of the literature addressing developing
countries is focused on China [e.g. Xia et al. 2012], India [e.g. Kolaskar et al. 2007] or South
Africa [e.g. Beute 1992, Biseswar et al. 2012], with limited literature focused on other parts of
Africa. Foster and Heeks (2010) note gaps in the literature related to the development role and
potential of ICT micro-enterprises. Tessler et al. (2003) discuss the strategic importance of
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ICT literacy and capacity in developing the public and private sectors as well as attracting
foreign direct investment.
This study bridges this existing knowledge gap in an African context by identifying
factors impacting on the evolution of mechanisms supporting open innovation and ICT
entrepreneurship in Africa. This study is part of a series of papers based on longitudinal
research focused on innovation ecosystems in Africa (Cunningham et al., 2014, 2015a,
2015b). Summarised results were reported in Cunningham (2015c). The findings from this
study have important practical and policy making implications for strengthening national and
regional innovation ecosystems as well as providing a useful foundation for further research.
1.1 Research Objectives
This study aimed to identify factors impacting on the current levels of open innovation and
ICT entrepreneurship in Africa.
Research objectives included to
Determine which stakeholder groups are currently supporting open innovation and
ICT entrepreneurship in a regional cross-section of 8 of 55 (14.5%) countries across Africa
Analyse why open innovation and ICT entrepreneurship is (or is not) being actively
supported at national and regional policy and implementation levels across Africa
Assess the current perceived benefits, challenges and opportunities associated with
supporting wider adoption of open innovation and ICT entrepreneurship in Africa
Identify good practices related to how different stakeholder groups collaborate to
support open innovation and ICT entrepreneurship in Africa
1.2 Research Questions
The main research question of this study was what factors impact on the current level of open
innovation and ICT entrepreneurship in Africa? (RQ1).
Sub-questions included:
Which stakeholder groups are currently supporting open innovation and ICT
entrepreneurship in Africa? (RQ2)
What are the primary reasons why open innovation and ICT entrepreneurship is being
actively supported at national and regional policy and implementation levels in some African
Member States? (RQ3)
What are the primary reasons why open innovation and ICT entrepreneurship is not
being actively supported at national and regional policy and implementation levels in other
African Member States? (RQ4)
What are the perceived benefits, challenges and opportunities associated with
supporting wider adoption of open innovation and ICT entrepreneurship in Africa? (RQ5)
What good practices can be shared among innovation stakeholders based in or
working in Africa? (RQ6)
2. METHODOLOGY
2.1 Data Collection
Based on the study aims, objectives and research questions, a qualitative approach to data
collection was selected based on the possibility to achieve deeper understanding of the current
situation, with a face to face survey selected as the research strategy (Denscombe, 2010).
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As the purpose of this study was to capture insight from different contexts across
Africa, an interview based data collection method was selected. Interviews can be carried out
one-on-one, as a group and face to face or remotely (Denscombe, 2010). Having reviewed the
different options, a semi-structured, moderated focus group was selected as the most
appropriate data collection method. Focus groups typically consist of 6 – 9 people exploring
attitudes, perceptions, feelings and ideas about a topic through moderated discussion
(Denscombe, 2010). When it is possible to get appropriate experts together, a focus group is
very useful in identifying and assessing any shared views on the issue being researched.
Firstly, it provides some degree of structure to facilitate comparative analysis, while
offering the opportunity to collect richer data based on the insight and experience of
informants and their interaction with one another (Denscombe, 2010). By facilitating
reactions from informants to other contributions, this can enrich discussion as well as the data
captured. Secondly, it was the most feasible research strategy based on availability of the
researcher's contacts to participate in face-to-face meetings and the limited timeframe
available in which to undertake the study. Thirdly, it was less time consuming than one-on-
one interviews and offered the opportunity to make use of group dynamics and group
interaction to elicit information (Denscombe, 2010).
IST-Africa Week 2015 (04 – 08 May, Lilongwe, Malawi) provided an excellent
opportunity for face-to-face engagement with experts from the public and education and
research sectors from across Africa. The selection of informants is discussed in 2.2 Sampling
Strategy.
The focus group was held in a private meeting room in the Bingu International
Conference Centre. Audio recording facilities were put in place to supplement
contemporaneous notes taken by the researcher. After welcoming and thanking all informants,
each informant was given two copies of the Informed Consent Form which they read and
sign. The primary researcher presented a summary of the research study objectives and
contextualised the focus group by presenting some definitions of open innovation and ICT
entrepreneurship.
2.2 Sampling Strategy
In the case of this study, an exploratory sample was selected, driven by the need to capture
new insight and leveraging non-probability sampling based on expertise and experience
(Denscombe, 2010). Purposive sampling offers the advantage of targeting informants based
on their relevance and domain specific knowledge (Denscombe, 2010).
Based on use of purposive sampling techniques, the most appropriate approach for this
study was intensity sampling (Creswell, 2007, Collins et al., 2007). Informants were selected
for their capacity to share insight and experience based on their intense (but not extreme)
experience of the phenomenon of interest. It was important to ensure good geographic
coverage as well as balance in terms of both gender and sectoral representation.
For this study, the sampling frame was based on identification of senior
representatives from the public and education and research sectors, with expert knowledge of
open innovation and ICT entrepreneurship in an African content. The shortlist of potential
informants was designed to ensure geographic and gender balance within the target sectors.
Potential informants were invited to participate, with a brief explanation of the study research
aims and objectives. They were informed that the focus group would be carried out in English
and recorded. Each informant was assured that participation was entirely voluntary and that
there would be no consequences of not participating. The sample of nine informants (5
females and 4 males; 5 public sector and 4 education and research sector) with geographic
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coverage of Cameroon, Egypt, Kenya, Malawi, Mozambique, South Africa, Tanzania and
Uganda was achieved with ten invitations.
2.3 Data Analysis
Creswell's Data Analysis Spiral (2007) outlines five steps of data analysis and report writing
which he considers to be “interrelated and often go on simultaneously in a research project”.
These steps are: (1) data management; (2) reading and memoing; (3) describing, classifying
and interpreting; (4) data representation; and (5) write up one or more versions of the research
report (Randolph, 2008). This study leverages this model as outlined in section 3.1 Data
Collection and Analysis.
Atlas.ti was used as the qualitative analysis tool for managing, coding, annotating and
analysing the transcripts. The codes were grouped into code families focused on types of
stakeholders supporting Open Innovation and ICT Entrepreneurship (section 3.2.1, figure 1),
rationale for supporting Open Innovation and ICT Entrepreneurship (section 3.2.2, figure 2),
barriers to supporting Open Innovation and ICT Entrepreneurship (section 3.2.2, figure 3),
perceived benefits (section 3.2.3, figure 4), perceived challenges (section 3.2.4, figure 5),
perceived opportunities (section 3.2.5, figure 6), good practices (section 3.2.6, figure 7) and
incentives (section 3.2.7, figure 8). The tool facilitated quotations to be extracted related to
the codes and code families which were then paraphrased for the purpose of presenting
results. Figures 1 – 8 provide an overview of the codes per code family related to the specific
research questions, and the number of times that each code appears in the transcripts.
2.4 Research Ethics
There were no risks to informants based on participation in this study, which was voluntary.
Informants were all adults, university graduates and fluent in English, and no vulnerable
people were targeted. The informants all read and signed two copies of an identical Informed
Consent form which were co-signed by the researcher (one retained by the researcher, one
retained by each informant). All informants agreed that data collected could be used for the
purpose of research, informing policy and associated publications (Appendix A). To ensure
anonymity, each individual transcript was allocated a unique numerical code, with the original
recordings and transcripts kept securely in Dublin, Ireland, only accessible to the researcher.
3. RESULTS
3.1 Data Collection and Analysis
The data was collecting using a moderated, semi-structured focus group. Following the focus
group, the full transcript based on the audio recording was created in MS Word, and then
segmented into individual transcripts to provide raw data for analysis. Each informant was
allocated a code to ensure that data was sufficiently anonymised prior to being imported into
Atlas.ti. Leveraging Creswell's model, as outlined in section 2.3, the data was prepared and
divided into units of analysis, with meaningful statements identified, and memos, annotations
and codes marked on the transcripts.
3.2 Results
The results presented in the following sub-sections summarise contributions from informants
in relation to: which stakeholder groups support open innovation and ICT entrepreneurship;
primary reasons why open innovation and ICT entrepreneurship is and is not currently being
supported; perceived benefits, challenges and opportunities; good practices; mechanisms to
incentivise stakeholder collaboration; and issues related to intellectual property rights.
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3.2.1 Stakeholders Supporting Open Innovation and ICT Entrepreneurship
There was strong agreement amongst the informants that a number of different stakeholder
groups support open innovation and ICT entrepreneurship in Africa. These stakeholder groups
include public, private, education and research and societal sector institutions, innovation
spaces, foundations and international donors (Table 1). National funding agencies are
included in the public sector. The variations in stakeholder emphasis from different
informants’ perspectives are interesting.
Figure 1 below provides an overview of the types of stakeholder groups articulated by
the informants.
Figure 1: Types of Stakeholders Supporting Open Innovation and ICT Entrepreneurship
According to one of the informants, the President of Tanzania is personally involved
in promoting entrepreneurship as a national strategic priority. Universities in Tanzania have
been instructed to actively support students considering establishing their own business.
Informant 6 noted the coordinated approach by the public, private and education and research
sectors in Kenya to open innovation and entrepreneurship. While the government of
Cameroon established a special fund to support ICT research and development, this is 80%
funded by the telecoms sector, and civil society are actively involved in managing Innovation
Spaces (Informant 8). Informant 5 discussed the integration of an ICT focused Innovation
Space in the Science Park established north of Maputo by the Mozambican Ministry of
Science and Technology. IST-Africa was recognised as actively supporting ICT innovation
and entrepreneurship across the continent. Informant 9 focused on highlighting the
engagement of the Malawi private sector (particularly telecom operators) in supporting ICT
entrepreneurship. Informant 4 gave the example of their own university in South Africa
having Innovation Spaces, a dedicated technology transfer office and open innovation and
ICT entrepreneurship friendly policies.
Table 1 summarises some of the examples of different stakeholder groups identified
by informants as supporting open innovation and ICT entrepreneurship. Some were
mentioned generically by organisational type, while others were mentioned by name.
Table 1: Examples of Stakeholders Supporting Open Innovation and ICT Entrepreneurship
Organisational Type Stakeholders
Education and Research Universities in Cameroon; Universities in Egypt; Kenyatta
University, Strathmore University, University of Nairobi,
Kenya; Chancellor College, University of Malawi; Eduardo
Mondlane University, Mozambique; NMMU, South Africa;
Universities in Tanzania; Makerere University, Uganda
Public Sector ANTIC (Cameroon); Academy of Scientific Research, ITIDA,
Ministry of Communication and Information Technology,
Ministry of Higher Education, Ministry of Scientific Research,
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Technology Innovation Entrepreneurship Centre (Egypt);
Ministry of Education Science and Technology, National
Commission for Science and Technology, (Kenya);
eGovernment Department, Malawi Regulatory Authority,
Ministry of Health, National Commission for Science and
Technology (Malawi); UTICT, Ministry of Science and
Technology (Mozambique); Department of Science and
Technology, Department of Trade and Industry, eSkills CoLabs,
Medical Research Council, National Research Foundation,
National Youth Development Agency, Small Enterprise
Development Agency, Technology Innovation Agency (South
Africa); Uganda Communications Commission, National
Information Technology Authority of Uganda (NITAU),
National Council for Science and Technology (Uganda);
African Union Commission; SADC; COMESA
Private Sector Google; HP; IBM; Microsoft, Nokia; SA Breweries; Telecoms
Companies, Press Trust in Malawi, Malawi Chamber of
Commerce
Innovation Spaces University hosted Incubation centres; ICT Incubators;
Cameroon Innovation Hub, Centre for Entrepreneurship,
Research and Innovation (Cameroon), Technology Innovation
& Entrepreneurship Center & Smart Village (Egypt), Chandaria
Business Incubation Centre, C4DLab, FabLab, @iLabAfrica,
iHub, NaiLab (Kenya), Maputo Living Lab & Science Park
(Mozambique), Centre for Community Technologies (NMMU),
eSkills Co-Labs, Raizcorp, South Africa Institute for
Entrepreneurship, The Innovation Hub (South Africa), BuniHub,
KINU (Tanzania); HiveCoLabs, iLab@MAK, Outbox (Uganda)
International Donors African Development Bank; European Union; Ministry of
Foreign Affairs of Finland; Japan, NORAD (Norway), SIDA
(Sweden), DFID (UK), Newton Trust (UK); USAID, World
Bank; Foundations.
3.2.2 Reasons why Open Innovation and ICT Entrepreneurship is and is not currently
supported
Figure 2 below provides an overview of the rationale for supporting Open Innovation and ICT
Entrepreneurship articulated by the informants.
Figure 2: Rationale for Supporting Open Innovation and ICT Entrepreneurship
There was general consensus around two main rationales for supporting open
innovation and ICT entrepreneurship at national and regional policy and implementation
levels across Africa.
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Firstly, the informants shared a perception that in general, public sector leadership in the eight
countries represented believed that supporting open innovation and ICT entrepreneurship was
well aligned with national development strategies. There is a clear expectation that they have
the potential to strengthen capacity and reduce youth unemployment and poverty.
Informant 3 emphasised the socio-economic growth potential of youth capacity
building and potential benefits of poverty reduction as a rationale for addressing youth
unemployment. Informant 7 noted that supporting ICT and entrepreneurship is part of
Kenya’s Vision 2030, based on the Government’s appreciation that these areas have
significant potential for job creation. In Cameroon, the primary objective of the national
development strategy is to reduce unemployment (Informant 8). The Government has
demonstrated its appreciation of the critical role ICT can play, based on the number of
policies leveraging ICT as an enabler. Informant 4 believed there is a realisation in many
African governments that entrepreneurship and innovation are key to growing African gross
domestic product (GDP). The challenge is that despite political will, there is often insufficient
enabling expertise, financial capacity or necessary infrastructure.
The second common rationale for supporting innovation and ICT entrepreneurship
relates to the policy goal of strengthening innovation capacity. The objective is to encourage
the establishment of new enterprises as well as import substitution by local enterprises
creating solutions tailored to local societal challenges.
Mozambique is supporting innovation and ICT entrepreneurship because the country
wants to develop domestic ICT capacity to address national needs and strengthen the formal
economy (Informant 5). Informant 1 had the perception from Tanzania in particular, and
Africa in general, that the key issue for most governments in youth unemployment.
Supporting innovation and ICT entrepreneurship is an investment in future job creation and
creating “local solutions to societal problems instead of having to source everything
internationally”. Informant 6 discussed the commitment of the Egyptian Government to
continue investing in platforms such as Egypt Innovate and sustain programmes previously
funded by UNDP due to their perceived impact potential. The public and education and
research sector are working closely together to address societal problems, leveraging the
relatively good ICT infrastructure that exists in the country.
Three main explanations were identified in relation to why open innovation and ICT
entrepreneurship are not currently being sufficiently supported in African member states.
Figure 3 below provides an overview of barriers identified to supporting Open Innovation and
ICT Entrepreneurship:
Figure 3: Barriers to Supporting Open Innovation and ICT Entrepreneurship
A significant common challenge identified by informants was the lack of prioritisation
for ICT, innovation and entrepreneurship when allocating available resources. Informant 2
discussed the impact of competing public sector economic interest, with ICT given lower
priority compared to other sectors, particularly agriculture, defence and education. Informant
5 considered that the relative poverty of Mozambique was a key reason why funds were
prioritised to other areas. This has resulted in inadequate national public sector investment to
date in innovation and entrepreneurship. The limited availability of relevant expertise and lack
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of understanding of strategic benefits are direct corollaries of the lack of prioritisation noted
above.
Informant 3 noted the key challenges in their country of lack of capacity in those
public sector institutions responsible for supporting enterprise creation and corruption and
mismanagement of funds. Informant 6 suggested that a key challenge in Egypt was the lack of
real world practical experience of those responsible for delivering innovation and ICT
entrepreneurship programmes. Entrepreneurs supported by Innovation Spaces often note they
learnt many things on their own, becuase those leading training programmes have "never been
there”. Informant 2 considered a key challenge in Uganda to be that ICT policies are not well
articulated and formulated in a piecemeal way. While training is being provided, general skills
levels are still low and they have fewer skilled people to develop and implement innovative
ideas.
The weak understanding among many policy makers (sometimes at Ministerial level)
and lack of public awareness of the strategic benefits of innovation and ICT entrepreneurship
was the final common challenge identified. Informant 1 noted the difficulties many
organisations have in understanding and identifying potential benefits. In Cameroon,
leadership commitment is a problem in several ministries because responsible ministers do
not understand the concept of ICT as an enabler (Informant 8). Informant 9 suggested a
similar challenge in Malawi, where benefits are often not properly ariticulated and there is
limited public advocacy of ICT entrepreneurship. As a result, ICT adoption and skills capacity
building is not given appropriate attention or allocated necessary resources.
3.2.3 Perceived Benefits
It was interesting that the perceived benefits on which informants focused were intrinsically
interlinked. There was clear alignment with the rationales described for why the African
public sector actively support open innovation and ICT entrepreneurship. Figure 4 below
provides an overview of perceived benefits of supporting Open Innovation and ICT
Entrepreneurship.
Figure 4: Perceived Benefits of Supporting Open Innovation and ICT Entrepreneurship
Firstly, there was strong agreement about the significant potential for stimulating job
creation. Informant 1 articulated that the biggest perceived benefits of ICT entrepreneurship
by the public sector are “more jobs, more business, potentially exportable products ... and
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more tax money”. Informant 8 and Informant 4 were in general agreement, with Informant 8
adding that the perceived benefits for the “man on the street” was to address basic needs
related to income and employment. Informant 5 and Informant 7 both focused on job creation
opportunities in general, while Informant 2 focused on employment opportunties for youth.
Informant 9 focused on opportunities for self-empoyment.
Secondly, there was also strong agreement about the perceived potential to contribute
towards better quality of life by improving service delivery and reducing corruption.
Informant 7 and Informant 9 discussed potential opportunities to improve service delivery.
Informant 3 focused on how bridging the digital divide and the potential of ICT to preserve
indigenous knowledge and reduce poverty. Informant 8 and Informant 9 also saw
considerable potential for using ICT (supported by appropriate policies and enforcement) to
increase public sector transparency and reduce corruption.
Thirdly, it was perceived that a major benefit was the creation of local solutions
designed around local requirements, reinforcing the secondary rationale for supporting
innovation. Informant 9, Informant 5 and Informant 6 in particular foresaw considerable
potential benefits in creating local solutions addressing societal challenges in a variety of
areas. Other perceived benefits included tax revenues, inclusiveness and export potential.
3.2.4 Perceived Challenges
Figure 5 below provides an overview of perceived challenges associated with supporting
Open Innovation and ICT Entrepreneurship.
Figure 5: Perceived Challenges Associated with Supporting Open Innovation and ICT Entrepreneurship
The informants articulated a number of interrelated perceived challenges. The primary
challenge identified was the limited pool of African entrepreneurial role models around which
to build an open innovation and ICT entrepreneur friendly culture. While very successful
entrepreneurship models exist, Informant 6 and Informant 1 agreed that there is a limited pool
of experts in Africa who really understand entrepreneurship and open innovation. Putting it in
the words of Informant 6; “we don’t want theoretical entrepreneurship, we want practical
people who got their hands dirty”.
Secondly, there were a variety of different reasons identified for why African
governments tend not to prioritise supporting open innovation and ICT entrepreneurship.
These range from resistance from government officials, afraid that wider ICT adoption by the
public sector might expose inefficiencies, bad practices or corruption (Informant 8) to a
perception that innovation and entrepreneurship is not core to changing or transforming
society (Informant 6). Informant 6 also made the point that when funds are available, the
public sector will apply them to address societal problems – ignoring that ICT can act as a
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multiplier in this regard. Informant 1 also argued that from the public sector perspective, if the
government supports ICT entrepreneurship, they may be perceived to be supporting people
who are already doing relatively well compared to the general population in terms of
education etc. There is also the challenge that ICT companies require a minimum level of
skills, which requires public sector investment before it can solve “the problem of uneducated,
unemployed masses”. Finally, Informant 5 discussed the need to develop a business model for
supporting innovation and entrepreneurship to achieve some degree of sustainability for the
day when support is no longer available.
Thirdly, barriers associated with ICT adoption and building an open innovation and
ICT entrepreneur friendly culture were both socio-cultural, resource and skills related in
nature. Informant 8 and Informant 4 talked about lack of confidence (particularly related to
cybersecurity), lack of awareness and poor understanding of the strategic importance of using
ICT. Informant 7 made the point that lack of confidence affects acceptance, which in turn
slows the level and speed of adoption. Informant 4 also discussed issues related to
affordability and accessibility as barriers to wider adoption of innovation and ICT. Informant
2 and Informant 4 both highlighted the critical barrier of lacking sufficient human resources
with the appropriate skills to adequately support innovation and ICT entrepreneurship and the
skills required to develop applications and be an entrepreneur.
While it is important to remember that some of these barriers may vary in intensity in
the eight countries represented, none of the informants indicated that these issues do not
reflect the reality on the ground in their country.
Finally, there were particular challenges associated with supporting adoption of open
innovation and ICT entrepreneurship in rural communities, where the majority of Africans
still live. Informant 7 talked about the lack of infrastructure in rural areas in Kenya and the
fact that most available resources seem to be used in Nairobi. Informant 3 made the point that
the people who can provide technical support for ICT work for big businesses in cities,
leaving rural community based enterprises at a disadvantage. Furthermore, most of the
ambitious entrepreneurs tend to leave for urban areas. Informant 3 also highlighted the need
for education and training for prospective entrepreneurs because “people do not understand
the responsibilities that come with self-employment”. One informant also discussed the risks
of an entitlement mentality develop with over dependence on development aid.
3.2.5 Perceived Opportunities
Figure 6 below provides an overview of perceived opportunities as a result of supporting
Open Innovation and ICT Entrepreneurship.
Figure 6: Perceived Opportunities as a result of supporting Open Innovation and ICT Entrepreneurship
Informants input in relation to perceived opportunities focused around four main
areas. Firstly, improving service delivery was identified as a prime opportunity by many of
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the informants, particularly for rural and other disenfranchised constituencies. Informant 1
described how using ICT to improve service delivery to poor people and rural areas is a long
term objective of governments and international donors. The reality is that ICT has a key role
to play, particularly in poor countries dealing with long term challenges associated with
delivering services to large populations. This point was reinforced by Informant 7 who saw
opportunities for ICT based services to improve quality of life and help achieve inclusiveness
of disadvantaged groups, especially in rural areas. Informant 3 believed that rural areas in
Southern Africa are badly underserviced, and that supporting innovation and ICT
entrepreneurship will help improve service delivery. Informant 2 saw clear opportunities to
leverage ICT to help deliver innovative solutions in education, agriculture and health.
Secondly, economic transformation was also identified as an important opportunity.
Informant 6 explained the widely held perception that due to Egypt’s cultural background and
language, it can access an enormous market across EMEA (Europe, Middle East, Africa). A
combination of good capacity and relatively cheap labour in Egypt provide a foundation for
innovation and entrepreneurship to act as a catalyst to transform the national economy.
Informant 8 considered that innovation and entrepreneurship can improve production and
increase economic growth. Informant 3 suggested that innovation can facilitate virtual
incubation, which can be a good tool to support start up enterprises.
Thirdly, capacity building was seen as offering an exciting opportunity. Informant 4
focused on the transformational potential of open innovation and ICT entrepreneurship across
Africa, particularly in the areas of skills capacity building and improved service delivery.
Informant 5 agreed, emphasising the opportunity for national capacity building in the areas of
skills, software and technology development. Informant 9 reinforced that consensus,
emphasising the opportunities that mobile technology adoption presents to change lives by
addressing social needs in the areas of education, healthcare and agriculture.
Finally, leveraging ICT to improve access to education, reducing the digital divide,
research and gender empowerment were also identified as important opportunities. While
Informant 2 focused on ICT solutions, Informant 8 discussed the opportunity to reduce the
knowledge gap between urban and rural areas. Informant 3 and Informant 9 both focused on
education, the former - educational and vocational training opportunities for young people
through distance learning, the latter – researching innovation. Informant 4 discussed the
opportunities that open innovation and ICT entrepreneurship offer to “generate a whole new
energized generation of women on the continent”.
3.2.6 Good Practices
Figure 7 below provides an overview of good practices articulated by the informants.
Figure 7: Good Practices
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The informants identified a number of good practices that could strengthen open
innovation and ICT entrepreneurship capacity in Africa. First, informants highlighted the
strategic importance of activities that actively encourage stakeholders to engage and
cooperate, in creating a solid, sustainable foundation for open innovation and ICT
entrepreneurship. Informant 9 talked about the potential benefits of coordinated collaboration
between different stakeholders to create a single integrated solution achieving different
impacts for participating stakeholders and maximising return on investment and objective by
sharing costs. In Malawi for example, the ICT regulator, Ministry of Health and University of
Malawi are working together to leverage skills in electronics, computer science and health.
Informant 8 described an example of good practice from Cameroon, based on identifying
innovative ideas through a public competition. Having shortlisted the most potentially
impactful ideas, different stakeholders from the societal, education and research and private
sector were invited to collaborate in deciding how to transform ideas into employment
creating businesses.
Informant 6 discussed the benefits of collaboration with multinationals such as Intel
and IBM and targeting students and recent graduates through hackathons and maker
hackathons. These are potential good practices that can be used to simultaneously harvest
good ideas and sensitise the public about innovation and entrepreneurship. Hackathons and
maker hackathons are used to select the most suitable candidates to support through
incubators or accelerators.
Informant 2 discussed the importance of avoiding duplication of effort and
mechanisms to achieve that objective. These included stakeholder meetings oriented around
creating synergies and workshops and seminars bringing together different stakeholders to
discuss existing regional ICT Policy.
Secondly, the informants emphasised the role of Living Labs and the contribution of
education, training and mentoring. Informant 1 and Informant 5 discussed good practices in
the context of Living Labs, highlighting RLabs from South Africa and Maputo Living Lab
from Mozambique. RLabs and Maputo are both focused on skills capacity building and the
use of open innovation. However, RLabs is more oriented around engagement with local
communities and community driven innovation, while Maputo Living Lab is developing
software for public institutions responsible for agriculture and facilitating skills transfer
between entrepreneurs and students.
Informant 1 gave the examples of an ICT-enabled entrepreneurship programme for
women and Team Academy funded by the Finnish government. Based on experience in South
Africa, the FEMTANZ Programme has proven successful in Tanzania and been replicated
across Southern Africa. Focused on general entrepreneurship training, the TEAM Academy
model originated in Finland and subsequently replicated in Tanzania. Informant 3 made the
critical point that innovation change must be driven by end-user communities. Mentoring and
hand holding were required hand in hand with good change management practices.
Thirdly, the informants noted difficulties associated with supporting ICT
entrepreneurship, including issues related to incubation, and made some interesting
observations. Informant 7 discussed the relative isolation in which some Innovation Spaces in
Nairobi tend to work. Closer collaboration with the education and research sector would
benefit everyone as well as providing access to mentors with a range of different skills.
Informant 1 discussed the challenges associated with incubation and ICT entrepreneurship
support mechanisms and made the point that it will take more time to determine the most
successful approaches. This opens the door to exploring whether replicating existing models
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or developing new one is more appropriate, as well as the opportunity to explore what works
best in different contexts.
Finally, the informants made some recommendations of their own in terms of good
practices. Informant 3 took a pragmatic, almost philosophical oriented approach, focusing on
the necessity to understand and address the real needs of the public, the need for flexibiity and
adaptation reflecting the fact that each community is dfferent and the strategic importance of
guiding rather than leading innovation. Informant 7 recommended a coordinated multi-
stakeholder approach, ensuring different stakeholder groups work together to solve problems
and develop innovations. This approach ensures that the outputs of such collaboration are
supported by other stakeholders and that no one is left behind. Informant 4 suggested that the
most significant good practice that the rest of the world can learn from Africa is “the use of
mobile technology in innovation and entrepreneurship”.
3.2.7 Incentives for Stakeholder Collaboration
Figure 8 below provides an overview of potential incentives articulated by the informants to
promote multi-stakeholder and ideally multi-sectoral collaboration. Informant 2 made the
important point that incentives are not limited to economic benefits – they could also be
philosophical or humanitarian, depending on the drivers for the stakeholders involved.
Informant 1 gave an international example of public sector good practice in this area, focusing
on a strategic policy decision by TEKES, the national innovation and technology funding
agency of Finland. 10 – 15 years ago, TEKES made it signficiantly easier for the education
and research sector to access national research and innovation grant funding if they made a
joint application with industry partners. Today this collaborative multi-stakeholder model is
recognised as a success, creating an open innovation research culture in Finland.
Figure 8: Potential Incentives to Promote Stakeholder Collaborations
Despite this, it is hardly surprising that in resource-constrained environments,
financial incentives were a common response. Informant 4 focused on the critical nature of
“solutions for Africa, by Africa, in Africa” in supporting open innovation and ICT
entrepreneurship. The most relevant incentives for start-ups were the provision of experience,
expertise and seed funding. Reflecting differences in national economic realities and
expectations across Africa, Informant 9 recommended tax incentives to encourage multi-
stakeholder collaboration of up to one and a half times the investment in open innovation and
naming rights of labs for organisations sponsoring research facilities - a common
phenomenon in developed countries.
Going beyond economic and social incentives, informants placed considerable
emphasis on awareness raising and sensitization as critical to encouraging greater levels of
collaborative research and innovation. Informant 2 stressed the need for stakeholders to be
sensitized to the benefits of supporting innovation. Informant 3 focused on the contribution
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that collaboration can make to strengthening teams and creating further innovation
opportunties. Informant 3 noted the contributions of academia to increasing the body of
knowledge and the need for entrepreneurs to be shown how collaboration benefits them.
Informant 4 emphasised that sharing knowledge and skills capacity building was a key
incentive to collaborate.
The informants noted the strategic importance of stakeholder engagement and a strong
sense of common ownership. Informant 7 raised the issues of incentives and keeping the
education and research and private sectors up to date with public sector plans. Informant 7
also raised the idea of participation of industry in public sector management boards. Informant
8 noted the important of shared IP ownership between collaborating stakeholders, balancing
potential benefits with clearly defined rules for each shareholder. Informant 8 placed
considerable weight on knowledge sharing between stakeholders.
The informants also emphasised the critical facilitating role of the public sector. For
example, Informant 5 discussed the responsibility of the public sector in terms of capacity
building programmes and policy leadership to encourage greater collaboration between
different sectors. Informant 6 acknowledged that the current level of support for innovation
was insufficient to strength the innovation ecosystem, suggesting that the public sector must
also intervene to help universities build commercial spin-offs.
3.2.8 Other Issues
In concluding this Focus Group on Open Innovation and ICT Entrepreneurship, many of the
informants identified Intellectual Property (IP) rights as a critical issue that had to be
addressed. With the exception of South Africa, it was identified as a key weakness in many
African countries, partially for cultural reasons which require active public sensitization.
While the existence of IP related legislation was noted by Informant 4, the challenges
this creates for experimenting with open innovation was raised as an issue. This contrasts with
the situation in other African countries where IP legislation does not currently exist, as is the
case in Malawi (Informant 9). When discussing Tanzania Informant 1 noted that culturally it
was acceptable to copy content, as the concept of copyright and IP ownership was either
unknown or not well understood. Informant 9 noted difficulties when considering legislation
in Cameroon, due to confusion about whether copyright protection should be for source code,
the name of software or core functionality. The consequences for open innovation were noted
by Informant 1. People are afraid that their creations will be copied as there are essentially no
legal consequences of IPR theft. Informant 1 stressed the necessity in many African countries
of informing legislation, and sensitizing and educating the public before open innovation can
be more widely adopted.
4. DISCUSSION
It was obvious that all the informants believe it is beneficial to support open innovation and
ICT entrepreneurship in an African context, despite the challenges and barriers identified.
Considering the geographic diversity of the informants, this suggests that the results of this
study may warrant further investigation in terms of broader geographic implications.
In relation to Research Question One, a number of key factors impacting on current
level of open innovation and ICT entrepreneurship in Africa were identified by the
informants. These include: level of political will reflected by resource prioritisation;
alignment with national development plans and associated funding priorities, level of
understanding of strategic benefits by ministers and senior civil servants, level of awareness
and sensitization of the general public, availability of national innovation and entrepreneurial
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expertise, and willingness and capacity to cooperate with other stakeholders to achieve
common goals.
Findings and policy recommendations in the literature are generally consistent with
the findings of this study, suggesting wider potential applicability and relevance across
Africa. In a comparative analysis of factors influencing the development of different national
innovation ecosystems, Al-Abd et al. (2012) noted the strategic policy and funding priority
allocated to innovation by the US, France and Taiwan. While significant public research
funding was available in each country, the private sector carried out much of that research.
This strengthens national innovation and entrepreneurial expertise, while promoting
cooperation between innovation stakeholders. In the context of applying these lessons to
United Arab Emirates Al-Abd et al. (2012) focused on the strategic importance of public
sector commitment, investing in innovation and skills development of local engineers and
entrepreneurs and supporting the establishment of local businesses.
Naude et al. (2011) made the point that innovation requires highly knowledgeable,
experienced and skilled entrepreneurs and highly-skilled labour. Public policies and
investment in capability-building are key to fostering entrepreneurial innovation. James et al.
(2011) found that collaboration between the public, private and societal sectors was critical in
promoting innovation, and offering the key benefits of maximising impact and saving time
and scarce resources.
The African Observatory of Science, Technology and Innovation (AOSTI) published
an assessment of science, technology and innovation capacity needs and priorities in 2013.
AOSTI (2013) recommended actions to address a key finding that most African policy makers
did not adequately understand concepts related to innovation and innovation policy. NEPAD
(2014) highlighted that many innovation-active companies in Africa collaborate with partners.
Most collaboration partners were domestic and ranged from members of the supply chain to
public and education and research sector organisations. The main barriers to innovation were
research related costs and risks and lack of financial resources. The key recommendations
presented in the Review are centred on four main themes: (a) improving the leadership,
coordination and management of STI; (b) developing programmes that encourage innovation
and technology adoption by the private sector; (c) growing the science, engineering and
technical work force; and (d) creating incentives to align the public technology providers with
the needs of the private sector.
In relation to Research Question Two, the results suggest that across the eight
countries represented, there is generally a greater level of engagement by the public sector,
Innovation Spaces and international donors in supporting open innovation and ICT
entrepreneurship. (Table 1, Figure 1). In the case of private sector organisations, international
firms, telecom operators and chambers of commerce are most active. There may be some
correlation between perceived challenges associated with availability of national innovation
and entrepreneurial expertise, but it is equally likely to relate to existing mandates and priority
areas across different sectors. There is a significant opportunity for the public sector and
international donors to mobilise greater engagement by the private, education and research
and societal sectors. The public sector should consider active engagement with foundations.
In relation to Research Question Three, the primary reasons why open innovation
and ICT entrepreneurship are being actively supported at national and regional policy and
implementation levels in some African member states relate to top level government buy-in
and perceived opportunities to address high levels of youth (and graduate) unemployment,
which is critical to the successful implementation of African national development strategies.
Addressing unemployment challenges requires a strong focus on capacity building of youth
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for both employment and self-employment and supporting the creation of innovative local
enterprises with the necessary skills and expertise to create solutions addressing local market
needs. There is clear expectation that innovation and ICT entrepreneurship can play a critical
role in enabling national solutions to pressing socio-economic and socio-cultural challenges.
The corollary is Research Question Four, which focused on explaining why active
support for open innovation and ICT entrepreneurship was not forthcoming in some African
countries. Reasons identified are both expected and unexpected. A source of considerable
potential concern should be the clear potential disconnect in some countries between top level
government policy buy-in and weak understanding of how policy will be implemented in
practice by responsible line ministers and senior civil servants. A further source of concern
should be the low priority placed on explaining to the general public how innovation and
entrepreneurship can potentially have a transformational impact in their lives, and that
investment in innovation and entrepreneurship can have a multiplier effect in key sectors such
as education, health and agriculture. Without a minimum level of public understanding, it is
easy to understand why available resources often ends up being allocated to other sectors of
the economy. The perception that necessary government capacity to support enterprises and
potential corruption are reasons for lack of prioritisation should result in countermeasures
being put in place. Capacity building, strong local ownership and sensitization of both the
general public and policy makers are critical to address these identified weaknesses.
Research Question Five is focused on perceived benefits, challenges and
opportunities associated with supporting wider adoption of open innovation and ICT
entrepreneurship in Africa. Perceived benefits clustered around the potential for stimulating
job creation, supporting better quality of life by providing a framework to reduce the potential
for corruption and improve service delivery (particularly to rural areas and other
disadvantaged stakeholders), and finally, the creation of local solutions addressing local
requirements. Perceived challenges associated with ICT adoption and building an open
innovation and ICT entrepreneur friendly culture focused on the limited pool of
entrepreneurial role models and potential mentors in many African countries, limited public
sector prioritisation of resources, socio-cultural, resource and skills capacity barriers
associated with ICT adoption and specific challenges associated with interventions in rural
communities, where the majority of Africans still live. Perceived opportunities include
improving service delivery, particularly for rural and other disenfranchised constituencies,
economic transformation, capacity building, addressing the digital divide, research on
innovation and gender empowerment.
Good practices highlighted to be shared among Innovation Stakeholders based in or
working in Africa (Research Question Six) included: the strategic importance of activities
that actively support stakeholders to engage and cooperate to create a sustainable foundation;
leveraging mentoring, training and structured programmes to support capacity building;
focusing on areas of strength such as use of mobile technologies and the necessity to provide
an environment that addresses actual needs on the ground.
This is particularly important in the context of adapting training programmes that have
been used successfully in other African countries. Incentives to support and motivate
stakeholder collaboration proposed by the informants included a range of financial,
philosophical and humanitarian alternatives, but above all stress the necessity of political
leadership and creating a sense of common ownership.
These findings are aligned with literature. NEPAD (2014, p 149) recommended the
need to further promote investment in research and development across Africa through
options such as tax incentives and support for human capacity development. The report (p13 –
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14) noted that critical issues including human resource development, employment creation,
financing and incentives were addressed by science, technology and innovation policies in
countries including Ethiopia, Ghana, Kenya, Lesotho and Mozambique.
InfoDev/World Bank (2014, p19) emphasised the need to provide technology
entrepreneurs with support to both scale activities and attract funding. The lack of
management training and business skills development prevent many entrepreneurs from
formulating realistic business plans and convincing potential funding sources to provide
financing to support growth. James et al (2011, p87) noted that in collaborative ICT4D
projects located in areas with limited availability of critical skills, incentives were
recommended to keep up-skilled personnel from leaving societal impact projects for better
paying private sector employment.
This is a striking cognitive dissonance associated with some of the responses received
to Research Questions Two, Three and Five. While there was clearly a strong correlation
between support for innovation and ICT entrepreneurship and increasing employment
opportunities, there was also a perception of a lack of necessary awareness of associated
potential benefits and opportunities, not just amongst the general public, but also more
worryingly, amongst some line ministers and senior civil servants. Despite top level
government recognition and clear policy alignment with long term socio-economic
development policy, potential barriers to public sector support for innovation and ICT
entrepreneurship included the perception that those with the capacity to become ICT
Entrepreneurs were privileged compared to the general population, ICT related employment
opportunities were unsuitable for the majority of the unemployed – the uneducated, and lack
of leadership commitment.
Investment is required in (a) sensitizing the general public and in particular the public
sector, (b) education, training and mentoring to strengthen the skills capacity of entrepreneurs,
potential entrepreneurs and stakeholders (including innovation hubs) supporting open
innovation and ICT entrepreneurship, and (c) community building activities and incentives
(financial and otherwise) to actively encourage greater stakeholder cooperation and
coordination to maximise the impact of available, scarce human and financial resources.
Beute (1992) concluded that South Africa needed highly skilled technological
personnel, innovation and entrepreneurship for economic development. While Biseswar et al
(2012, p233) limit their concept of innovation and entrepreneurship collaboration to a triple
helix model, they discussed the roles of the public, education and research and private sectors.
The public sector can create an enabling environment for innovation, entrepreneurship and
competitiveness through policy and legislation. education and research and private sector
organisations have a key role in generating ideas, research and development, knowledge
transfer and skills.
Kolaskar et al. (2007) also took a similar triple helix based conceptual approach. They
noted the necessity of systematic reform of the tertiary and skills based vocational education
sectors in India. The objective was to provide a framework to develop national capacity and
facilitate collaboration between the public, private and education and research sectors. While
Xia et al. (2012) took a game theory approach rather than an empirical approach, they found
that the benefits of open collaboration were greater for all parties than semi-open or closed
innovation. Reflecting the significant deficit of local entrepreneurship role models identified
by this study, Ekekwe (2015) noted that the creation of ecosystems fostering local champions
capable of creating jobs is required to address the simultaneous growth in economic activity
and youth unemployment in Africa. Foster et al. (2010) note that ICT micro-enterprises
leverage both social and business networks in their day to day business operations. Tessler et
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al. (2003) note the strategic importance of developing indigenous software development
capacity. They emphasise the opportunities to create high value employment for engineers in
software services, and educated non-engineers with appropriate language skills in ICT-
enabled services businesses.
The findings of this study suggest that a high priority should be given to sensitizing
and educating the general public as well as senior political and civil service leadership of the
potential benefits of supporting innovation and ICT entrepreneurship.
4.1 Practical, Societal and Ethical Implications
The research findings have important practical, societal and policy making implications for
African public, education and research, societal and private sector organisations. They also
raise important issues that should be carefully considered by international donors including
foundations in the context of considering how open innovation and ICT entrepreneurship
could play an enabling role when supporting local, national and regional interventions.
The findings highlighted a number of practical issues that must be addressed to
improve the wider adoption of Open Innovation and ICT Entrepreneurship. From a policy
point of view, it suggests that there is a serious capacity gap to be addressed between policy
objectives related to innovation and entrepreneurship and how these objectives are
implemented in practice. It is not foreseen that there are ethical implications, other than
consideration being given to how ICT can increase efficiency and transparency and reduce
potential corruption.
4.2 Verification of Data and Results
Each individual transcript was annotated and coded incrementally. The credibility of the data
has been determined based on achieving data saturation during data analysis. While each
informant presented their own experiences and perspectives, it is interesting how discussion
related to each research question clustered around a relative core number of common issues.
The exceptions to this were related to Benefits (Figure 4) and Challenges (Figure 5) where
there were a more diverse number of issues discussed. This reflects differences in the
environment in different African Member States. The aggregated results were circulated to the
informants following data analysis to facilitate further verification of the results presented in
this paper. Informants confirmed that the aggregated results reflected their perception of the
situation across the countries represented in the Focus Group.
Each step undertaken in relation to sampling (section 2.2), methods selection (section
2.1), data collection (section 2.1) and analysis (sections 2.3 and 3.1) has been clearly
documented to support confirmability by other researchers. Furthermore, the coding of the
transcripts was independently checked by another researcher for consistency, with a positive
result.
Transferability opportunities could include checking if findings are generalizable in
the context of a similar study with wider geographical (and sectoral) representation across
Africa. There is a high level of dependability of the results as the same process was followed
in terms of both data collection and analysis.
4.3 Limitations of the Findings
There were a number of key limitations of this study. Based on good practice, the focus group
was limited to nine participants. While this number falls within the minimum sample size
recommendations for the most common research designs (Collins et al, 2007, p273), this is
still a relatively small sample size. A deliberate limitation of this study was to only engage
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with public and education and research sector informants, with a view to gathering
intelligence from policy makers and institutions with a mandate to support policy
implementation as it relates to innovation and ICT entrepreneurship. The nine informants (5
women, 4 men) were selected from the public and education and research sectors (five public
sector, four education and research sector) in eight African member states (Cameroon, Egypt,
Kenya, Malawi, Mozambique, South Africa, Tanzania and Uganda). While this provides
geographic representation from Northern, Southern, Eastern and Central Africa, the findings
of this study may not be representative of the situation in other African Member States.
This approach essentially excluded gathering perspectives and insights from other
relevant stakeholder groups including the societal, private and funding sectors and critically,
both prospective and existing ICT entrepreneurs. It is quite likely that the perspectives of
societal, private and broader funding sector stakeholders may be different to those shared by
the participating informants.
The focus group was also conducted entirely in English with informants who had a
high level of fluency in English, but different mother tongues. This decision was made to
facilitate identification of shared or divergent views (Denscombe, 2010) in a common
language, and avoid the potential confusion and significant costs associated with use of
simultaneous translation and a requirement for multilingual transcription. However, it is
possible that additional nuances or details may have been captured if all questions and
answers were in the mother tongue of each informant. While gender balance (5 women, 4
men) and geographic diversity was addressed, because only two innovation stakeholder
groups and eight countries were represented, it is possible that the results may be biased to
some degree because of these study constraints.
4.4 Future Research
Given that this study focused on capturing the perspectives of key innovation stakeholders
from the public and education and research sectors, a future study will undertake a focus
group with representatives of the private, societal and international donor sectors. Future
research will also examine (a) whether these results are generalizable in other African
countries, (b) identify differences and similarities in perspective and experience from the
private, societal and international donor sectors and (c) create and validate potential
models/methodologies to address the challenges and opportunities identified in this study.
5. CONCLUSION
This research study focused on evaluating factors impacting on the current level of Open
Innovation and ICT entrepreneurship in Africa. The research questions were answered by
analysing results from the Focus Group. There was strong agreement in relation to the long
term benefits of supporting Open Innovation and ICT Entrepreneurship in an African context,
despite the challenges and barriers identified.
Following data analysis, the results highlighted six main factors that impact on the
current level of Open Innovation and ICT Entrepreneurship in Africa: a) level of political will
reflected by resource prioritisation; b) alignment with National Development Plans and
associated funding priorities; c) level of understanding of strategic benefits by Ministers and
senior civil servants; d) level of awareness and sensitization of the general public, e)
availability of national innovation and entrepreneurial expertise; and f) willingness and
capacity to cooperate with other stakeholders to achieve common goals.
Based on the results, there is a greater level of engagement by public, education and
research, societal and international donor sector organisations than private sector
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organisations in supporting Open Innovation and ICT Entrepreneurship across the eight
countries represented. While it was agreed that investment in Open Innovation and ICT
Entrepreneurship can assist in addressing critical socio-economic challenges associated with
unemployment and enabling national solutions, challenges to be addressed include capacity
building, funding priorities and building an open innovation and ICT entrepreneur friendly
culture.
Mechanisms suggested to address these challenges include: a) facilitating activities
that actively encourage stakeholders to engage and cooperate, in creating a solid, sustainable
foundation for Open Innovation and ICT Entrepreneurship, such as Living Labs; b) aligning
grant funding with co-creation of products and services; c) awareness raising and sensitization
to the associated benefits and d) capacity building to increase the availability of national
innovation and entrepreneurial expertise.
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
This research was co-funded by the European Commission under IST-Africa (FP7 Contract
288691). The interpretation of the results is the sole responsibility of the primary researcher,
based on the contributions of the informants. The primary researcher would like to thank the
senior representatives of key public and education and research sector institutions who
participated in the focus group for their invaluable contributions and insight. The primary
researcher would also like to acknowledge support provided by Dr. Matti Tedre, DSV,
Stockholm University during the paper preparation.
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