Rice360 Institute for Global Health Technologies
(Pictured above: Students of Kenyatta University working on their low-cost innovation during the 2023 Kenyatta University and Rice360 design competition’s boot camp. Photo: Kenyatta University.)
Rice360 Institute for Global Health Technologies is an initiative at Rice University that engages engineering students to invent solutions to global health challenges in low-resource settings, and also cultivates invention education at African universities to support the development of local innovation ecosystems that address the UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs).
Rice360’s programs include the Newborn Essential Solutions & Technologies program (NEST360), which aims to halve newborn mortality in Africa by 2030 by offering low-cost, sustainable technologies to treat the leading causes of newborn death. Rice360 also works with partners across the Africa Invention Education (IvE) Network to catalyze invention through African universities to solve local and global challenges.
The Lemelson Foundation currently supports Rice360’s work to enable Kenyan universities to engage more actively in the national innovation ecosystem, led by the Kenya National Innovation Agency (KeNIA). This includes the launch of a first-of-its kind “Impact Invention” master’s degree program at Kenyatta University (KU). The Medical Device Innovation (MDI) Program partners with the medtech industry in Kenya to train health innovators and address critical talent gaps.
Rice360 and KU have co-created a plan to build pathways within Kenyan universities to drive similar graduate education programs that support inventors throughout the full innovation life-cycle — connecting with industry to launch new ventures and grow the broader innovation ecosystem needed to reach the SDGs.
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