mLab Southern Africa has entered into a partnership with the Council for Scientific and Industrial Research (CSIR) aimed at stimulating more open innovation and development within the mobile health (m-health) and wellness sector.
mLab is a technology accelerator and non-profit company which focuses on skills, product and enterprise development within the technology innovation economy across the mobile, Internet of things, data sciences and digital design verticals.
"The wearable medical device market, while relatively new, created over $3 billion in market value last year at a compound annual growth rate of 17.8% in the next four years," says Derrick Kotze, CEO of mLab Southern Africa.
"This is just one of the opportunities in m-health and wellness, which also includes data and analytical tools, virtual reality, robotics, apps, fashion and more, and it offers local innovators and start-ups a gap to become market leaders in a new economic sector. Our vision with this partnership is to accelerate South Africa's participation in this rare window of economic opportunity."
The partnership will include a number of m-health and wellness programmes to help facilitate knowledge transfer, ideation, development and commercialisation by local experts, students, start-ups and larger industry partners, with the most notable being the launch season of the first Demola event in SA.
The Demola will bring together local and international industry, SMEs and multidisciplinary students to develop solutions for real m-health and wellness challenges. The first Demola season will kick off in Cape Town in July and will have a dedicated m-health and wellness stream.
"Best practice from open innovation models which have been applied in Living Labs in South Africa over the last eight years indicated the Demola open innovation model is a unique contribution. Demola applies an exciting open innovation model where multidisciplinary teams co-create novel products which can stimulate the national system of innovation in South Africa," says professor Marlien Herselman, CSIR Meraka Institute and former chairperson of the Living Lab networks in Southern Africa.
The Demola network stretches across 11 countries and 14 locations, linking together over 50 universities and 600 company partners.
"Wearable technology is expected to reach $31.27 billion by 2020 and South Africa is uniquely positioned to not only benefit from this disruptive technology, but also to contribute relevant and innovative local products," says Dr Adele Botha, CSIR Meraka Institute.
"The mLab and the CSIR partnership to unlock the local m-health and wellness open innovation economy is premised on the assumption that innovation is only as strong as the ecosystem in which it is created. As such, the collaboration with mLab, higher education, industry and other stakeholders endeavours to stimulate a resilient South African m-health and wellness innovation ecosystem to ultimately benefit the people of South Africa."
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