The Co-creation Hub, Africa’s largest innovation hub, and Ojoma Ochai have announced the launch of a new Creative Economy Practice.
The practice will be focused on stimulating increased innovation and technology adoption in the African creative economy to catalyse further growth in the sector and capture maximum value for African creatives and other sector players.
These outcomes will be delivered through a range of activities including ecosystem and community development activities, research and insight sharing, business incubation and acceleration as well as investor education and advocacy.
Consequently, the Africa-focused Practice will be led by Ojoma Ochai as Managing Partner and will join the family of leading innovation enablers under the CcHUB umbrella which includes the CcHUB Design Lab in Rwanda, iHub and eLimu in Kenya, Growth Capital by CcHUB and CcHUB Syndicate.
Ms. Ochai has over 15 years of experience supporting the development of the global creative economy through contributions to various initiatives including capacity building, technical assistance to the public and private sector and leading international cooperation projects in the cultural and creative industries.
A Fellow of the DEVOS Institute of Arts Management, University of Maryland, USA, an Associate Fellow of the Nigerian Leadership Institute, she also sits on the board of the African Technology and Creative Group.
Ms. Ochai also worked for many years at the British Council and her most recent posting in the organisation was as Regional Director for Arts and Creative Economy Programmes for British Council in Sub Saharan Africa until October 2021. While at the British Council, she worked with colleagues across Sub-Saharan Africa and the UK to devise strategies and lead programme teams to deliver positive artistic, social, economic and Cultural Relations outcomes, particularly for young people working in the Arts, and the Creative and Digital Economies.
She is a member of the UNESCO Global Expert Facility for the 2005 Convention on the Protection and Promotion of the Diversity of Cultural Expressions where she advises the multilateral agency and has supported national governments like The Gambia, Jamaica, and Nigeria to implement the convention and grow their Cultural and Creative Industries. She has worked on various international creative and digital sector development efforts including with the World Bank as well as with the Swedish Arts Council.
Co-creation Hub (CcHUB) launched Nigeria’s first open living lab for technologists, entrepreneurs, tech companies, investors and hackers in 2010 to accelerate the application of social capital and technology for economic prosperity.
The hub has since expanded to include an umbrella of pan-African innovation enablers that includes the CC Hub Design Lab in Rwanda iHub and eLimu in Kenya, Growth Capital by CcHUB and CcHUB Syndicate.