#ThrowBackThursday 🚀 What an incredible journey! The Innovation Sprint Demo Day brought together over 100+ attendees including 16 teams, mentors, partners, and the innovation community to celebrate a massive milestone. This demo day was the culmination of the Automatic Speech Recognition (ASR) program. What started as ideas evolved into functional prototypes including AI models, applications, and research specifically designed to address challenges faced by people with speech impairments. 5 teams secured funding: • Audiva – USD 1,500 • Team Trevor – USD 1,000 • Voxsign – USD 1,000 • Tuwaye – USD 750 • Wulira – USD 750 This initiative is co-funded by Google.org and part of #AT2030Programme led by UCL’s @GDIHub and Centre for Digital Language Inclusion (CDLI), in collaboration with @senses_hub and @miic_ug. A heartfelt thank you to all participants, mentors, partners, and supporters who contributed to making this journey and Demo Day a success👏 #InnovateWithUs

Congratulations to Team Voxsign our #GraduateInnovationProgram Cohort 1 startup for securing USD 1,000 at the Inclusive Technology Innovation Sprint Demo Day! 👏 Voxsign is an adaptive speech recognition web application that translates non-standard speech into Ugandan Sign Language, helping bridge communication gaps through inclusive innovation. The team participated in the Automatic Speech Recognition Programme, an initiative co-funded by Google.org under the #AT2030Programme, led by UCL’s @GDIHub and its Centre for Digital Language Inclusion (CDLI), in collaboration with @senses_hub and @miic_ug We are proud to celebrate this milestone and excited to see the team continue building a more accessible and inclusive future through technology. 🚀 #InnovateWithUs #MIICStartups

Advancing Inclusive Speech Technology in Africa! 5 months ago together with @senses_hub and @GDIHub, we set out on the journey towards building inclusive speech technology for non-standard speech focusing on Research, AI Model development and product development and now in the final stretch, gearing up for the highly anticipated Demo Day this April, where participants will have the opportunity to compete for seed funding of up to €5,000. As part of this journey, we conducted a series of engagements with innovators on: ⚡ Innovation sprint 💡 Ideation and team formation 🧩 Codesigning and organization of people with disability (OPD) 🛠️ Technical build session 📊 Solution presentation and feedback 🎯 Technical mentorship 👨‍🏫 Technical mentorship and fine-tuning The sessions marked a significant milestone, where teams were able to develop functional products ready for user testing. #InnovateWithUs