Team Matibabu, a group of Ugandan graduates from Makerere University are no strangers when it comes to local innovators in Uganda, participating in a number of hackathons, and other innovation programs locally and internationally (Globally) . The ASME Innovation (iSHOW) ;…
Team Matibabu, a group of Ugandan graduates from Makerere University are no strangers when it comes to local innovators in Uganda, participating in a number of hackathons, and other innovation programs locally and internationally (Globally) .
The ASME Innovation (iSHOW) ; global competition for hardware led social innovation that focuses on the design & engineering journey of taking physical products to market – released the top 10 finalists for its iSHOW Kenya competition with Team Matibabu for their innovative solution; a Non-invasive diagnostic kit used to detect Malaria, emerged to be among the finalist battling it out with 9 other teams.
The Matibabu device uses a custom-made portable device called a matiscope, which is connected to a smartphone, to do a rapid diagnostic test. The user’s finger is inserted into the matiscope, and the application uses a red light to penetrate the skin and detect the red blood cells.
After a public voting that ended on Wednesday 24th, May 2017, the iSHOW crew on Thursday 25th, May 2017 crowned, Team Matibabu; who emerged overall winners with 538 votes, winning what they iSHOW crew termed as ‘Extra Cash ‘for their project. The team won USD$10,000 and also become part of the iSHOW alumni network; a global community of hardware innovators with exclusive access to experts and resources.
“We are really excited about this milestone as a team, it’s at a time when we’ re going to do clinical trials & we were still resourcing for the funding. I can now say we’ re ready to achieve that, ” Moris Atwine; Founder at Think IT and a team member of Matibabu told Guru 8.
Now Matibabu, with other two winning team; Science set and Sign IO (also won USD$10,000 each) , will be part of the 30 finalists who will pitch to the judges in person and will receive product exposure, advice and technical insights. Only 9 teams will win a share of USD$500,000 (roughly 1.8 billion UGX) in prizes – including an extensive design and engineering review by a panel of experts.
