Recently, we’ve been posting more on opportunities for robotics education in Africa. (ie. June 14th’s post “Announcing the African Robotics Network (AFRON)“). As we mentioned before, robotics are a key factor in enhancing industry, fostering scientific innovation, and ultimately, boosting GDP and increasing the quality of African life.

The Universities Robotics platform was launched in 2008 by EXPO21XX, an online exhibition. As Dr. Seth Quartey informs us, the initiative started with partners in the robotics industry to provide university robotics labs a channel to display diverse robotics researches and education-related projects, all cost-free. It’s also meant to serve as a permanent updatable repository as well as an invaluable resource for the research community and other robotics enthusiasts. Most importantly, the platform offer robotics labs a modern multimedia technology outlet to make it to the news media.

Additional benefits are:

• The platform enables easier global dissemination of robotics technology
• Some universities in Africa and Europe, depending on their courses, use the platform as a resource
• The platform has lots of interesting projects for Junior robotics groups

Currently, more than 140 university robotics labs from around the world collaborate in this venture. A couple of African universities currently participate:

• University of Kwazulu-Natal, South Africa (you’ll find it on this corridor)
• Ashesi University College, Ghana (uses the platform as a resource)

{Universities - Research in Robotics}

More universities are constantly being recruited. Unfortunately, as of writing, very few African universities have a robotics program. That’s sure to change in the coming decade, and the University Robotics platform will surely be there to provide guidance.