About the Milken-Motsepe Prize in AgriTech Winners
In April 2021, the Milken Institute and the Motsepe Foundation launched the Milken-Motsepe Innovation Prize Program, focused on accelerating progress toward Sustainable Development Goals 1 and 2: no poverty and zero hunger. The first innovation competition in the program, the Milken-Motsepe Prize in AgriTech, challenged entrepreneurs to create innovative solutions to increase economic value to farmers, from seed to sale. More than 3,000 teams (3,300) from 105 countries registered for the innovation competition. Twenty-five teams were selected for the finalist round, each receiving $10,000 to field-test their innovations in Africa.
Five teams whose innovations met the rigorous field-testing requirements were ultimately selected as winners and traveled to the 2023 Milken Institute Global Conference in Los Angeles to receive their awards before a global audience.
NovFeed took home the $1 million Grand Prize, Karpolax and IRRI-AfricaRice took second and third prizes, and $100,000 bonus prizes went to Kuronga for the most creative use of Fourth Industrial Revolution Technologies and to COOL LION for the People’s Choice public voting award.
Meet the teams and learn more about what inspired them and what they hope to achieve.
The Milken–Motsepe Innovation Prize program is a series of multiyear, multimillion-dollar innovation competitions for technological solutions that accelerate progress toward the UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs).