Africa Innovation Council
A continental think tank, established in partnership with Princeton University's Africa World Initiative, building the policy intelligence and convening power that Africa's research and innovation agenda demands.
The gap
Nigeria taught Ife how one country builds the institutions behind an innovation economy — the funds, the laws, the hubs. The question that now occupies him is how fifty-four countries do it together. Africa's research and innovation agenda needs what every serious agenda needs: dedicated institutions, honest data, and the convening power to turn ideas into policy and policy into industry.
What it is
The Africa Innovation Council is a continental think tank established in partnership with Princeton University's Africa World Initiative. It exists to generate policy intelligence, convene the people who move capital and rules across the continent — policymakers, multilateral development banks, and academics — and support the research and innovation infrastructure agenda that individual national programmes cannot build alone.
Where it is headed
As a Founding Member and Executive Director-designate, Ife is helping stand the Council up, with a flagship continental convening in planning. The positioning is deliberate: not another conference series, but a durable institution for Africa's innovation decade — the continental complement to the national work he has spent his career on.
