The Erna Hamburger Prize 2025 will be awarded to Dr. Rose Mutiso.

The award ceremony will be held on Tuesday, October 7 ^th at 6:30 pm at SG 1138.

The detailed ceremony program is included below to give an overview of the evening, which will be closed by a cocktail around 8:30 pm.

Registration required, free entry.
Registration via this link.

Summary of her presentation: “The concept of technological leapfrogging, by which developing countries can skip traditional development stages or specific incumbent technologies and adopt newer approaches, has dominated African development discourse for decades. Mobile phones are the canonical success story, with Africa’s rapid adoption in the mid-1990s to 2000s fueling optimism about replicating this phenomenon across sectors. But too often, these leapfrogging narratives are built on hype, misdiagnosed problems, and a reluctance to face hard truths about poverty, infrastructure gaps, and structural inequality.
In this lecture, I draw from my experiences working on energy transitions and innovation policy across the Global North and South to unpack what’s missing in our conversations about technology and development. Why do promising innovations so often fall short of impact? What makes some succeed against the odds? And what does it take to ensure that new technologies actually serve the people who need them most? 
Ultimately, I argue for a shift from shortcut thinking to structural thinking, and from tech optimism to tech realism, as we imagine more inclusive and durable pathways for science and technology in Africa and beyond. As Africa faces new technological frontiers from artificial intelligence to biotechnology and next-generation energy systems, the stakes of getting this right are higher than ever.”