Did you know that around 1.35 million people die annually due to road accidents? Students of MSc. In Embedded and Mobile Systems sponsored by Centre of Excellence for ICT in East Africa at the Nelson Mandela African Institution of Science and Technology has an innovative idea to solve this problem!

Three students of Embedded and Mobile Systems, sponsored by Centre of Excellence of ICT in East Africa at the Nelson Mandela African Institution of Science and Technology (NM-AIST) Mr. Juvenarlys Knamis, Ms. Ange Josiane Uwayisenga, and Ms. Josephine Mbandi supervised by Dr. Michael Kisangiri, a faculty member of the NM-AIST, formed a team with GIZ experts from Tanzania, Kenya and Morocco to submit an innovative solution for road safety to the GIZ Innovation Fund 2020. The innovation scored the 1 st place in the Community Voting platform among almost 100 submitted ideas. As a result, 20,000 Euro has been provided to the team for further development and testing of their innovation before it is pitched to the GIZ Management Board in December this year.

This Drowsiness Detector uses an Artificial Intelligence based technology to determine whether the driver is sleepy or drunk even before it comes to dangerous steering behavior. The technology encompasses an Infrared Camera that scans the driver’s increase in head motion.

Infrared technology provides functionality for detection in case of a driver wearing glasses and during night, which are some of the situations when most road accidents occur.

The detector will be placed in public service vehicles and not only send signals to the driver and the passengers in the vehicle, but also alert the school, public transportation authority or company. The aim is to develop an inclusive low-cost gadget to serve the community and avoid as many road accidents as possible.

The team has been directly admitted to the Accelerator and will receive professional coaching and a budget of EUR 20,000 to develop and test the idea further. Finally, it will be pitched to the.