Design competition 2017

Theme

UBORA is an educational and design platform for the co-design of open source biomedical devices to address current and future global healthcare challenges. It is a new method for creation of innovative solutions that take into account needs, safety, feasibility, efficacy and performance. The 2017 UBORA Design Competition seeks innovative biomedical engineering solutions from students (individuals or teams) to reduce child mortality.

According to WHO, the first 28 days of life represent the most vulnerable time for a child’s survival, and in 2015, 5.9 million child deaths under the age of 5 were reported. Therefore, this year’s UBORA design challenge will focus on creating effective and affordable solutions which will contribute to improved child health outcomes.

Evaluation procedure

First stage

Projects should be prepared according to the template downloadable here.

The evaluation process will be based on the following criteria:

  1. Health Impact (5 Points):
    1. Does the project focus on the child mortality? (3Points).
    2. Illustrates how the innovation will address the health need (1Point).
    3. Demonstrates potential for widespread health impact (1 Point).
  1. Technology/Process/Systems Innovation (5 Points):
    1. Offers a new and creative solution (‘better/faster/cheaper’) (2 Points).
    2. Provides convincing rationale for why this unique approach has the potential to work (1 Point).
    3. Addresses significant technical issues relevant for global settings and should be cost efficient (1 Point).
    4. Multi-disciplinary teams are encouraged (1Point).

Second stage

Projects should be prepared according to the template downloadable here.

  1. Health Impact (3 Points):
    1. Does the project focus on the child mortality? (2 Points).
    2. Illustrates how the innovation will address the health need (1 Point).
  1. Technology/Process/Systems Innovation (7 Points):
    1. Offers a new and creative solution (‘better/faster/cheaper’) (2 Points).
    2. Provides convincing rationale for why this unique approach has the potential to work (2.5 Point).
    3. Addresses significant technical issues relevant for global settings and should be cost efficient (2 Point).
    4. Multi-disciplinary teams are encouraged (0.5 Point).

Benefits

For the 24 best-ranked projects travel and full-board will be provided for one team member to attend the UBORA Design School to be held in Kenyatta University (Nairobi – Kenya) from 23rd to 27th October 11th to 15th December  2017.

Eligibility criteria

Participants should be enrolled as students in one of the Universities of the UBORA consortium (ubora-biomedical.org) or ABEC consortium (abec-africa.org). Students who have already obtained a Masters degree (in any discipline) will not be admitted.

Submission procedure

The project brief must be one PDF document saved as Project Brief_Title_Last name of Applicant. Send the file to [email protected]

Important Dates

Timeline for 2017 UBORA Design Competition:

  1. Project brief submission as per template – due on 8th April  15th April 2017 (Midnight CET).
  2. Notification to applicants accepted for full proposal submission – 28th April  8th May, 2017.
  3. Submission of full proposals as per template – due on  25th July  28th July, 2017 (Midnight CET).
  4. Announcement of finalists –28th August, 2017.