Freetown, 8th June, 2026 – President Julius Maada Bio, in his capacity as Chief Launcher, will tomorrow inaugurate Sierra Leone’s new national innovation home, UniPod Sierra Leone, at Fourah Bay College, University of Sierra Leone. The UniPod will serve as a platform for the country’s inventors, engineers, coders, and entrepreneurs.
The Government of Sierra Leone, in partnership with the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) through its flagship pan-African innovation initiative timbuktoo, and the University of Sierra Leone, will officially launch the UniPod with President Bio presiding over the ceremony.
A message behind the launch emphasizes: “Sierra Leone is not opening a building; it is opening a platform where young people build the future.” UniPod Sierra Leone provides young people with a space to design, build, and scale solutions to everyday challenges, while giving them a stake in the innovation economy.
As a University Innovation Pod (UniPod), the facility is delivered under timbuktoo, UNDP’s flagship pan-African innovation initiative. UNDP brings the vision, investment, and continental network; timbuktoo provides the model; and the UniPod offers the space where innovation comes to life. The Government of Sierra Leone convenes the platform, while Fourah Bay College the oldest university in West Africa provides its home.
Launched on the world stage at Davos in January 2024, timbuktoo is UNDP’s bold bet on African talent: a continental network of University Innovation Pods and sector hubs designed to equip tens of thousands of young innovators and help their startups scale. Sierra Leone, one of the founding countries, now joins a growing wave of UniPods lighting up campuses across Africa.
On launch day, President Bio will unveil the plaque, cut the ribbon, and tour the facility, meeting innovators face to face. The exhibition will showcase youth-led projects spanning solar power and clean energy for farmers, plastic recycling and the circular economy, AI and digital tools tailored to local needs, and creative-economy startups. Launch week will sustain the momentum with a media preview, a youth demo day featuring live pitches, and an ecosystem roundtable to translate the energy of the day into real commitments and a 100-day action plan.
Aligned with national and global goals, the initiative supports Sierra Leone’s priorities for youth employment, digital transformation, and human-capital development. It also advances the Sustainable Development Goals, notably SDG 8 (Decent Work and Economic Growth), SDG 9 (Industry, Innovation and Infrastructure), and contributes to SDG 4 (Quality Education).
University Innovation Pods (UniPods) are timbuktoo’s campus-based delivery infrastructure collaborative innovation spaces that provide young people with prototyping tools, mentorship, and pathways to investment. They are operational in more than a dozen African countries and serve as the post-event home where hackathon teams continue to build.
