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Inclusive Innovation is development of new products, services and solution with social and/or environmental impact together with and for low-income markets that have been excluded from the development mainstream.
What is Inclusive Innovation? How can it be applied to sustainable development and even just basic business practice? These were some the questions answered during the Inclusive Innovation workshop that took place at the Southern African Innovation Summit earlier this month.
The workshop – Making Inclusive Innovation the Mainstream Approach – formed part of the Southern African Innovation Support (SAIS 2) programme’s annual Innovation Forum event. Bopinc, a global thought-leader supporting multinationals, SMEs and start-ups in the design and delivery of socially and commercially viable business models, facilitated the session and introduced the audience to 8 Ways to Strengthen Your Inclusive Innovation Training Programme, which they co-wrote with the SAIS 2 team.
It is an exciting time for Inclusive Innovation – the entrepreneurial development of something new, with impact together with and for low-income markets that have been excluded from the development mainstream. As international awareness grows on the need to include underserved groups in the development of products and services, new business opportunities arise for entrepreneurs who want to combine profit with making a social impact.
However, many startups and SMEs in low-income markets struggle to find the support they need to turn their ideas into viable business solutions. For this reason, SAIS 2 and Bopinc collaborated to design and deliver an Inclusive Innovation training programme for local innovation support organisations in Southern Africa and their communities of entrepreneurs.
8 Ways to Strengthen Your Inclusive Innovation Training Programme presents some of their biggest learnings about how to effectively train others on the topic of Inclusive Innovation. The aim is inspire incubators, accelerators, donors, policymakers, and other organisations to set up similar programmes and build on what has been learned. Inclusive Innovation is an exciting new discipline to teach to entrepreneurs and innovation support organisations alike, but providing training to these stakeholders comes with its own challenges. The SAIS 2 team and Bopinc hope their efforts assists others to understand what works, what doesn’t, and why, so that they can strengthen their training programmes or perhaps even feel confident enough to build new programmes of their own.
If you are interested in the Inclusive Innovation workshop that was held on 2 October during the SA Innovation Forum, a livestream was recorded:
