Tobilola Ajibola of Dresses by Aloli and Adegoke Olubusi of OneMedical have emerged winners of the 2016 Etisalat Prize for Innovation. The winners were announced at the Etisalat Prize for Innovation Award ceremony on Saturday, November 5, where they received N2 million and N5 million respectively.
OneMedical is a cloud-based health records platform that enables hospitals and healthcare facilities across Nigeria to digitise their patient records, improving efficiency and resulting in cost savings. Patients pay a small fee of N500 to create their medical file while it’s free to use for hospitals. OneMedical emerged as the winner in the Most Innovative Product or Service launched in the previous year category and the team will use the prize money to scale their covering and offerings.
Dresses by Aloli, an online custom clothing store for women aged 13 – 65, won in the Innovative Idea (SME or individual) category. The store offers stylish and functional ready to wear clothes in addition to personalised couture services. It seeks to eliminate the stress of missed deadlines typical with Nigerian tailors. The online platform also helps designers create patterns for their collections.
Speaking at the event, Matthew Willsher, CEO of Etisalat Nigeria said, “Innovation differentiates leaders from followers and is the core of growth. Nigeria and our industry are both institutions and entities that require growth, taking advantage of technology change with a lot of creative thinking and new ways of doing things to help us meet the needs of society. Innovation helps us run things more efficiently, meeting the education, healthcare, lifestyle and communications needs which make life easier for people. The Etisalat Prize for Innovation is our initiative to reward innovation and we hope it will catalyse the innovation spirit in Africa.”
The Etisalat Prize for Innovation was created in 2012 to reward products, services or ideas that promote mobile broadband usage in Nigeria. This year’s call for entries was announced in August 2016 and in addition to the cash prizes, both winners and the other top 10 finalists will receive training at the Enterprise Development Centre of the Pan-Atlantic University, Lagos.
