Kenya National Innovation Agency

21/10/2026

"Innovation is the ability to see change as an opportunity, not a threat." Steve Jobs

20/10/2026

𝐇𝐚𝐩𝐩𝐲 𝐌𝐚𝐬𝐡𝐮𝐣𝐚𝐚 𝐃𝐚𝐲

This Mashujaa Day, Kenya National Innovation Agency honours the heroes whose courage, sacrifice and vision have shaped Kenya’s journey.

We also celebrate the innovators, researchers and entrepreneurs whose ideas are driving solutions, creating jobs and shaping a better future for our nation.

May we continue to honour our heroes by turning ideas into impact and advancing Kenya’s socio-economic transformation through innovation.

19/10/2026

When looking to innovate- fail forward. Innovation can be a chaotic process, embrace it and learn from your failures.

16/10/2026

A fundable innovation must also be a trustworthy one.
The final day of the Proposal Development and Grant Management for Innovation training opened with ethics, intellectual property and safeguards in innovation grants, led by innovation management consultant Anne Lawi. Participants explored integrity and transparency, social and environmental responsibility, human subjects and data ethics and equity and inclusion, then looked at IP ownership, licensing and access, commercialization strategies and benefit-sharing. The day then brought the three days together in a case simulation facilitated by Anne Lawi and Peter Kuria. Teams took on the role of an innovation unit preparing a proposal for a National Innovation Challenge, development partner or impact investor, working on scenarios such as a renewable energy startup serving rural communities and an AI-enabled health diagnostics platform. They developed their proposals, pitched and received constructive feedback.

16/10/2026

15/10/2026

Day 2 of Proposal Development and Grant Management for Innovation Training.
For the last session of the day led by Peter Kuria an Innovation Management Consultant, participants focused on communication and reporting to funders. They explored the reporting framework, from progress and financial reports to final reports and monitoring and evaluation reports and what each must contain: a verified reporting period and deadline, achievements supported by evidence, spending against budget with variance explained, risks, learning and the next decision required.
A central message was that impact must be communicated without inventing success stories or exposing sensitive information.They also learned to tailor their message to different audiences, from funders and evaluators to farmers, advisers and partners, explaining practical usability and uncertainties.The session then turned to tools and formats for innovation proposal communication. Using a Horizon Europe case application, participants learnt how a research case can be communicated without overstating results, including the need for an anonymised concept version for first-stage evaluation. Each group built a pitch covering the problem, the innovation, the workplan, expected results, budget, delivery and risks and why this funder and why now, ending with a specific ask that agrees with the budget. Groups then rehearsed their pitches and exchanged targeted feedback with peers, with evidence valued above presentation polish.

15/10/2026

Day 2 of Proposal Development and Grant Management for Innovation Training.
Innovation does not end with a great idea. It grows through evidence, accountability and well-managed funding.
The first session, led by innovation consultant Daniel Midega, focused on Monitoring, Evaluation and Learning (MEL). Participants learned to define input, output, outcome and impact indicators aligned with their project objectives, mapping a results chain from inputs to impact using BRCK’s offline-first internet for schools and testing each indicator against the SMART criteria. They explored data collection methods for innovation, including surveys, usage analytics, participatory feedback, key informant interviews, field observation and existing records and why combining two or three methods makes findings more credible. The session also showed how to integrate MEL into an innovation project and proposal, from baselines and responsibility matrices to a MEL budget of 5 to 15 percent of the grant. Participants distinguished formative evaluation, which improves an innovation during implementation, as iTax did when it redesigned its portal mid-project, from summative evaluation, which judges final results, as NHIF Linda Mama did to support national scale-up. They also saw how participatory feedback puts communities at the centre, through tools like One Acre Fund’s farmer scorecards and AMREF’s community score cards.

On adaptive learning and iteration, participants learnt through the collect, analyse, decide and act feedback loop. Jumia Kenya used it to cut cart abandonment from 73 percent to 29 percent by integrating M-PESA and AMREF used 82 percent adoption data from Kisumu to make the case for scale. They also covered knowledge sharing and scaling decisions and compared Theory of Change, the Logical Framework and Results-Based Management as tools for planning and tracking results. The second session turned to Grant Management and Compliance, built on winning a grant and managing one are two different skills. Participants walked through the grant lifecycle, from pre-award readiness to close-out and the financial controls.

15/10/2026

Ideas create possibilities, but commercialisation turns them into viable enterprises that create jobs, drive economic growth and strengthen Kenya’s competitiveness.

This agenda shaped the 4th Edition of the Innovation & Business Summit 2026, held in Hola, Tana River County, from 7 to 10 October under the theme “Driving Economic Growth through Innovation & Entrepreneurship Commercialization.” The summit brought together county leaders, government agencies, development partners, international representatives, educational institutions and young innovators to explore how innovation and entrepreneurship can drive economic transformation.

Representing the State Department for Science, Research and Innovation, the Kenya National Innovation Agency (KeNIA), led by Deputy Director, Innovation Commercialisation, Ian Lugwiri, engaged county leaders on aligning local priorities with national innovation support programmes.

Discussions with Tana River Governor H.E. Major (Rtd) Dr. Dhadho Godhana and Kilifi Deputy Governor H.E. Flora Mbetsa Chibule explored opportunities to advance innovation commercialisation, while engagements with Konza Technopolis examined ways to expand young people’s access to innovation support.

KeNIA also supported youth innovation pitch sessions, giving local innovators a platform to showcase solutions and entrepreneurial potential.

The summit highlighted intellectual property protection, skills development and market access as critical enablers of commercialisation, reinforcing the role of innovation in building competitive enterprises, generating employment and driving sustainable economic growth.

14/10/2026

Day 1 of the Proposal Development and Grant Management for Innovation training concluded with sessions led by Peter Kuria, an innovation management consultant. After a walk through the nine building blocks of the Business Model Canvas, from customer segments and value propositions to revenue streams and key partners, participants formed teams and applied the canvas to their own innovations. A key lesson was to measure what matters. Tracking an innovation from capture to protection to commercialization is what makes it possible to scale. In their groups, participants found that specificity beats “everyone”: naming the exact customer or beneficiary sparked honest conversations. Teams kept returning to the value proposition at the centre of the canvas, asking whose problem they are solving and what proof they have. The toughest question was the one every funder will ask: who funds delivery now and who pays after the grant ends?
Participants were also encouraged to be honest in their V0, the first working draft of their funding proposal. That means labelling estimates, recording evidence gaps, confirming partners and never inventing, because a persuasive claim is not proof. Working through the canvas in teams showed how quickly a fresh perspective exposes a gap in your logic, which is why it comes before the proposal narrative.