DIGILOGIC High-Level Advisory Board members gave us food for thought

Experts and leaders from different areas of the innovation and logistics sector in Europe and Africa gathered for the first High-Level Advisory Board Meeting to meet their peer members, get a shared understanding of DIGILOGIC’s ambitions and spark fruitful discussions to inform upcoming activities.

DIGILOGIC High Level Advisory Board consists of selected experts in the field, from a diverse set of backgrounds and geographies, who have expertise in a subset of the topics that the project is developing. Our experts will meet three times a year and they will help us to:

• Assess the results of the project and support its long term sustainability.
• Support DIGILOGIC awareness.
• Advise on the specifications related to the Challenges.

DIGILOGIC organised the first High-Level Advisory Meeting on Wednesday 21st July 2021, and was the participation of ten expert Board members Flora Tibazarwa, Programme Director SAIS Programme, Mark Mwangi Founder CEO Amitruck, Fabio Scala Director at BNI - Banco Nacional de Investimento, Professor Olayinka David-West, Associate Dean, Lagos Business School, Pan-Atlantic University, Professor Rajkumar Roy, Dean, School of Mathematics, Computer Science and Engineering City, University of London, Holger Schneebeck Global Innovation Manager for Deutsche Post DHL, Chuka Alumona Franklin Alumona, Director - Global GTM Transformation and Distributor operations, Procter & Gamble, Mark Allison, Supply Chain and Logistics Executive, RTT Steven Gray Director Wardour Global and Eric Lwao Manager Postal Services for the Zambia Information and Communications Technology Authority (ZICTA).

After a round of introduction to get to know each other, Board members were given an overview of DIGILOGIC’s ambitions and achievements thus far. Special attention was given to two topics: the newly launched, e-learning platform the DIGILOGIC Community, and the future Call for Challenges to be launched next year.

The DIGILOGIC Community platform was introduced by Bongo-Hive as Board members were taken on a virtual tour of its different features, from capacity building on smart logistics, to networking and community building. From the input provided, Board members reflected on the following points:

• How to better define the different target groups for the platform and adequately generate tailored content of interest. Additional featured such as blogging and data base on networking opportunities, market information and
• As crucial food for thought, the Board members also raised the need to think about the sustainability and long-lasting upkeep of the platform post-project.

DIGILOGIC Challenges for innovators were then introduced by VTT, from its objectives of future-proofing African and European start-ups operating in the critical mile of smart logistics, beneficiaries and overall timeline.

• The Board members raised the need to have different tailored selection criteria for each of the four challenges topics
• To ensure greater geographical distribution of applicants and selected proposals, Board Members will be involved in the jury members.
• The Board members appreciated that the Challenges can provide real solutions to answer some of the real challenges for logistics in Africa