Nigeria's Research and Innovation Ecosystem Strengthening Deep Dive

This deep dive examines how RISA-supported interventions in Nigeria strengthened research commercialisation, ecosystem coordination, and early-stage innovation finance through three complementary pathways: Adam Smith International's Knowledge Exchange and Cascaded Commercialisation (KECC) project, the Impact Investors Foundation's financing and convening work through initiatives such as WIIF, Deal Source Africa, and NIIRIC, the University of Lagos' Innovation to Market (I2M) project and the Nigeria Academy of Science, strengthening Research Capacity in Nigeria project which focused on an early-stage researchers mentorship program. Taken together, these efforts show that Nigeria's innovation ecosystem does not need a single model. It needs multiple, mutually reinforcing pathways: open and distributed technology development, stronger financing architecture and convening platforms, and better institutional systems to move university-based research toward market use.