Ibukun Awosika, Chairman, Board of Directors, First Bank of Nigeria, presenting NHEF Scholars Program certificate to Mustapha Abdullahi (NHEF Scholar ’19).

Mustapha Abdullahi (NHEF Scholar ’19) and his team recently emerged as the third runner-up of the 3rd Annual Prof. Ayodele Awojobi Design Competition (PAADC) and were granted an investment portfolio of N700,000 to further develop the prototype of their idea for market entry.

The PAADC which held on the 27th of July at the J.F Ade Ajayi Auditorium, University of Lagos, is an annual Nigerian STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics) based design competition, targeted at the undergraduate population. The vision of the initiative is to encourage the development of indigenous solutions to Nigerian problems, using science and technology.

Mustapha and his team worked on a smart eyeglass solution for assisting the visually challenged (blind) to navigate their environment, read textbooks or magazines and browse the internet. The idea is called “iGlass”. It utilizes Artificial Intelligence and cloud computing technology, enabling the user to speak to the iGlass using a voice recognition system and the iGlass executes the user’s command.

When asked about his experience of the competition, Mustapha said: “training from NHEF helped me greatly to lead my team and network with investors effectively.”