The AAIX Africa–Asia Transnational Innovation Ecosystem Fellows Program is a high-selectivity fellowship for emerging leaders working at the intersection of innovation, governance, and systems change—and who believe that complex challenges can only be addressed through transnational co-creation.
Hosted within the Africa–Asia Innovation Exchange (AAIX), and supported by institutions including the African School of Government and the Asian School of Governance, the program enables leaders from Africa and Asia to build, connect, and strengthen innovation ecosystems across regions.
This is not a training program.
It is a proof-of-work platform for ecosystem co-creation.
Africa and Asia face shared, interconnected challenges—from climate transition and food systems to public service delivery and digital governance. Yet the people working on these challenges are still largely trained, incentivized, and recognized within national, sectoral, and organizational silos.
What is missing is not innovation or talent, but leaders who can work transnationally to strengthen innovation ecosystems—leaders whose contribution is not a single project, but the ability to co-create across contexts, institutions, and ways of knowing.
The Transnational Innovation Ecosystem Fellows Program exists to fill this gap.
Co-creation in AAIX is grounded in a systems innovation approach that draws on multiple, complementary sources of practice.
Fellows are introduced to and supported in using:
Problem-Driven Iterative Adaptation (PDIA), which anchors work in real problems and iterative learning,
Theory U, developed at the MIT Presencing Institute, which emphasizes deep listening, collective sense-making, and alignment across difference, and
Indigenous knowledge systems across Africa and Asia, which offer long-standing practices of collective decision-making, stewardship, and adaptation grounded in place and lived experience.
These approaches complement—rather than replace—the tools and methods Fellows already use, providing shared disciplines for working together across diverse contexts. Click here for more on our methodologies.
Together, they ensure that ecosystem building remains:
Anchored in locally defined, real-world problems
Relational, inclusive, and context-aware
Adaptive rather than blueprint-driven
Oriented toward learning across diverse African and Asian settings
Fellows work in Africa–Asia co-creation teams, embedded in initiatives where transnational collaboration is essential. Their core contribution is ecosystem co-creation, including:
Jointly framing shared problems across African and Asian innovation systems
Co-designing and iterating solutions using PDIA cycles, informed by Theory U practices of sensing and reflection
Drawing on indigenous knowledge systems to ground innovation in local realities and long-term perspectives
Linking incubators, labs, universities, governments, and funders
Turning practice into shared, reusable ecosystem assets
Fellows are not placed in a single organization.
They build Transnational Innovation Ecosystem Portfolios spanning countries, sectors, and institutions.
The program is designed for emerging leaders (2–15 years into their careers) working across:
Government and public policy
Business, finance, and market-building institutions
Civil society, social enterprises, and philanthropy
Innovation platforms, incubators, social labs, and university labs
Ideal Fellows are people who:
Are already working on real, complex ecosystem challenges
Are frustrated by fragmentation and duplication
Are comfortable operating without formal authority
Value shared ownership, learning, and adaptation
Respect multiple ways of knowing and working
The fellowship is unpaid by design. Fellows retain their primary roles; AAIX provides platform, partners, legitimacy, and co-creation infrastructure.
Fellows jointly define priority Africa–Asia challenges, map innovation ecosystem constraints, and design a PDIA-informed Co-creation Portfolio, integrating systems analysis, collective sensing (Theory U), and local knowledge.
Fellows work across AAIX-affiliated labs, incubators, universities, governments, and platforms to co-design, test, adapt, and learn through iterative PDIA cycles, supported by reflective and relational practices from Theory U.
Fellows convert adaptive practice into reusable ecosystem assets—playbooks, frameworks, partnership models—and publish a public AAIX Transnational Innovation Ecosystem Portfolio.
By the end of the fellowship, Fellows contribute to:
A Transnational Africa–Asia Innovation Ecosystem Portfolio documenting problems addressed, iterations tested, and learning generated
At least one reusable ecosystem asset, such as:
A cross-context co-creation or ecosystem design framework
A partnership or co-governance model
A shared financing, scaling, or coordination mechanism
Contributions to the AAIX Co-creation Commons
No reports for reporting’s sake.
Only assets others can adapt and use.
Fellows receive:
Access to the AAIX co-creation platform and convening power
Trusted partners across Africa and Asia
Senior mentors experienced in PDIA, Theory U, and ecosystem building
A peer cohort of high-caliber transnational operators
Institutional legitimacy to work across boundaries
The value is access, trust, and shared Africa–Asia credibility—not stipends.
The AAIX Africa–Asia Transnational Innovation Ecosystem Fellows Program creates a credible pathway for leaders whose primary contribution is ecosystem co-creation grounded in systems thinking and diverse knowledge traditions.
Over time, it aims to:
Normalize transnational ecosystem building as a leadership capability
Strengthen Africa–Asia innovation pathways
Position AAIX as a global reference point for problem-driven, relational, and adaptive systems innovation
The AAIX Africa–Asia Transnational Innovation Ecosystem Fellows Program is a high-trust platform for emerging leaders to co-create and strengthen innovation ecosystems—drawing on PDIA, Theory U, and indigenous knowledge systems—to make Africa–Asia systems work better, together.