Scaling African DeepTech - the gem - Feb 2026

This month, CERI partnered in hosting BRAIN 5.0 in South Africa, convening founders, investors, and researchers to move science-based innovation from the lab into real-world health and climate impact.

For more than a decade, Open Startup has been strengthening African innovation, engaging over 250 startups and building momentum around science-based entrepreneurship. At the centre of this work is BRAIN (Bridging Research and Innovation), a pan-African DeepTech accelerator now in its fifth edition. To date, BRAIN has supported more than 40 ventures across Health and Climate, helping founders progress toward investment and market readiness.

This month, BRAIN 5.0 was hosted in South Africa, bringing together 10 founders from six African countries alongside more than 20 partners, investors, and global experts. The bootcamp focused on one clear objective: moving DeepTech from labs into real markets and real capital. Through a verticalised Health and Climate curriculum, expert clinics, one-on-one coaching and ecosystem engagement, founders engaged directly with the realities that determine scale — validation, regulation, procurement pathways, manufacturing constraints and adoption timelines.

A key convening, co-hosted with Octoco Workshack, tackled a core challenge: Africa is not short on innovation, but on the conditions that allow DeepTech to scale beyond pilots. Panels explored AI and diagnostics in health systems, as well as climate and manufacturing realities, grounding discussion in data and practical deployment pathways.

BRAIN’s presence also extended into SWEAT Africa in Stellenbosch, where the DeepTech conversation continued in an open, cross-continental setting. An investor-focused panel unpacked what structurally differentiates DeepTech investing — from IP and regulatory complexity to capital intensity and longer timelines to exit. The discussion highlighted what early signals make a science-based venture credible and investable, and how founders must think about governance, scale and capital strategy from the outset.

Five BRAIN startups also took the stage, presenting advanced Health and Climate solutions rooted in rigorous science and built with global ambition.

As a partner, Centre for Epidemic Response and Innovation (CERI), sees this alignment as essential, believing that scientific excellence must be matched by deployment pathways that connect research to policy, industry, and capital. Platforms like BRAIN create the structured bridges between researchers, founders, investors, and public systems — ensuring that breakthrough ideas do not remain confined to laboratories or pilot projects, but evolve into scalable solutions capable of strengthening health systems and climate resilience across Africa.