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Happy holidays! Highlights of our amazing year

We have had a fantastic year and we are very grateful to have you all connected to the GDI Hub. We would like to share with you some of the highlights of 2019.

We hope you have an amazing Christmas holiday and a very Happy New Year. We look forward to an exciting 2020!

February
We announced the opening of the Snowdon Masters Scholarships with the Snowdon Trust.

Cathy Holloway won an East Innovators Award for her work with the GDI Hub.

We attended GSMA’s World Mobile Congress (WMC19)in Barcelona.

March
The Minister of State for International Development, Lord Bates, announced at the Sightheist event in London that the UK government was doubling its investment in our flagship AT2030 programme from £10million to £19.8million due to its success.

June
With our Kenyan partners, we launched Africa's First Innovation Ecosystem dedicated to supporting start-ups to develop new Assistive Technology products and services in Nairobi, Kenya.

We were part of the Conference of States Parties (COSP) to the Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities in New York, USA.

July
Our AT2030 website went live.

We attended GSMA's Mobile 360 – Africa in Kigali, Rwanda.

August
We were part of The Global report on Assistive Technology (GReAT) consultation summit held in Geneva. Our team contributed to five different papers.

We launched the website for the Disability Innovation Summit taking place in Tokyo, 2020. We will be co-hosting this event with the British Council Japan in partnership with Keio University Graduate School of Media Design (KMD) and the Global Cooperation on Assistive Technology (GATE) Initiative.

We were part of The Association for the Advancement of Assistive Technology in Europe annual conference (AAATE) in Bologna, Italy. Researchers from GDI Hub and partner organisations including the Clinton Health Access Initiative and ATscale organised a special session focused on sharing the work carried out so far as part of the AT2030 programme.

Cathy Holloway had a presentation at the National Conference on Assistive Technology AT-2030 held at Bengaluru, India.

September

We welcomed the first cohort of Disability, Design and Innovation MSc students.

The East London Inclusive Enterprise Zone (ELIEZ) was announced. It will be the UK’s most accessible technology hub. We are partnering with UCL, Plexal, Here East, and other organisations.

October

Four members of our team took part in the bi-annual International Society for Prosthetics and Orthotics (ISPO) World Congress, their flagship meeting held in Kobe, Japan.

November

We had AT Procurement workshops in Africa (South Africa) and Central Asia (Tajikistan) with UNICEF, WHO GATE, and CHAI.

December

We held two events to celebrate the International Day of People with Disabilities in Kenya and in Sierra Leone.

Happy Holidays card surrounded by pine