Insights into innovation stakeholder needs across Africa and Europe
By Paul Delivet, Technopolis Africa
Understanding Key Innovation Challenges: A Needs-Based Approach
As part of the launch of the Africa Europe Innovation Platform project, a large-scale study was carried out over the past six months to assess the needs of innovation stakeholders. Based on the input from over 200 stakeholders across 46 countries in Europe and Africa, this mapping exercise highlights persistent challenges as well as key priorities shaping innovation cooperation between the two continents.
The study focused on six groups of actors: business support organisations (BSOs), businesses (start-ups, SMEs and entrepreneurs), research actors, public and international policymakers, investors, and civil society organisations. The aim was to propose a transversal analysis of innovation, grounded in the understanding that ecosystems function as interdependent and interconnected systems.
Barriers to Cross-Border Cooperation: Fragmentation and Stakeholder Fatigue
One of the first observations made by the stakeholders interviewed is the need for more coordination and alignment between actors, platforms, and innovation support initiatives. This issue is part of a broader challenge that our study highlights through five cross-cutting obstacles to cooperation in the field of innovation:
- Limited access to finance, especially for African innovators, with a clear need to facilitate matchmaking with investors and develop support mechanisms suited to local contexts.
- A fragmented and siloed ecosystem, with limited collaboration between researchers, innovators, industry players and other stakeholders. This issue is particularly strong in African countries, where systems thinking in innovation ecosystems remains underexploited.
- Low visibility and territorial reach, with innovation actors often concentrated in capitals and large urban centres, and insufficiently connected to local realities and needs.
- Short-term collaboration mechanisms, with many initiatives tied to time-limited programmes, hindering long-term impact.
These barriers particularly affect underrepresented groups: women entrepreneurs, rural actors, and informal community networks, who are too often marginalised when supporting innovation.
The Missing Link Between Research and Market
The study also revealed a structural gap between academic research and market uptake. Although they coexist, research centres and innovation hubs collaborate too little to unlock their full innovation potential. This missing link is particularly critical in sectors such as health, agriculture, and the energy transition, where academic involvement is necessary and cross-sector collaboration is needed. Current funding tools and innovation support programmes do not sufficiently cover this intermediate phase, which is nonetheless essential to ensure a long-term continuum from research to innovation.
Mapping Needs: Actor Typology and Key Priorities
In addition to these cross-cutting challenges, the study offers a typology-based reading of the needs of future AEIP stakeholders. The objective is to design services and engagement modalities tailored to the needs and expectations of each link in the innovation value chain.
- Business Support Organisations (BSOs): Incubators, accelerators, tech hubs and innovation centres play a central role as intermediaries within innovation ecosystems. Despite strong momentum (over 600 tech hubs across Africa) BSOs face challenges in sustaining their business models and operating effectively in their local contexts. Key needs include sustainable financing mechanisms, better integration into public policy, and increased opportunities for networking and collaboration.
- Start-ups, SMEs and entrepreneurs: As direct drivers of innovation, they transform ideas into tangible solutions. Yet, both in Africa and Europe, they face difficulties in accessing finance and encounter structural barriers to project development. These actors are often isolated and lack targeted support mechanisms to connect them with other innovation stakeholders (research institutions, authorities, etc.).
- Academic and research institutions: These actors face chronic underfunding and insufficient valorisation of their work, with weak links between applied research and industrial needs. Despite their central role in the innovation value chain, limited resources for mobility, technology transfer and applied research constrain their full potential.
- Investors and funders: This stakeholder group includes VC (venture capital) firms, business angels, banks, public donors and development finance institutions. While essential to the innovation economy, the funding landscape in Africa remains emerging, especially on the private side. Key challenges include sourcing investment-ready projects, managing risk, and limited exit options. Across the board, actors emphasised the need for more suitable financial instruments, better coordination between funders, and improved access to investment opportunities.
- Public authorities and international partners: These actors expressed a strong need for better coordination and alignment. There is growing interest in strengthening monitoring tools and more effectively integrating the different links of the innovation value chain to guide public action and programme design.
- Civil society: Including NGOs, community groups, end-users and the general public, civil society is a critical but often overlooked actor in innovation. It acts as an intermediary between technology and communities. The study, largely focused on African respondents, highlighted needs in terms of inclusive participation, institutional recognition, and support for grassroots initiatives.
From Needs to Solutions: AEIP as a Connector
We see the mapping of needs as a first step towards designing long-term solutions to support research, innovation, and cooperation between Africa and Europe. It also reflects the importance of a paradigm shift: moving away from one-off projects towards shared infrastructure models, better suited to local contexts and more responsive to stakeholder expectations.
The AEIP platform aims to contribute to this ambition by serving as a connector and cooperation enabler between Africa and Europe. Its role is not to centralise, but to connect. One of its key strategic pillars is to build on a multiplier effect by connecting existing “networks of networks”.
These findings will guide the design and development of AEIP, ensuring that it is grounded in user needs, informed by good practice, and built for sustainability.
To stay up to date with any further AEIP developments, keep an eye on our website or follow us on LinkedIn and Facebook.