Prof. Wilberforce Owusu-Ansah, Pillar Lead for Health Entrepreneurship at the KNUST Africa Health Collaborative, has called on students to pursue innovation-driven businesses that can transform health outcomes.
He made the call at the opening of the Sustainable Business Start-Ups (SBS) Training Programme, emphasising that the initiative is designed to help students establish impactful, health-focused enterprises.
“One of the key goals of the programme is to train KNUST students to establish their own businesses in health-related areas. But the focus is not just on any health business. We are looking at transformational health businesses. And that is where the idea of a transformational journey comes in,” Prof. Owusu-Ansah said.
Now in its third year, the SBS Programme has trained more than 1,200 students, enrolling about 400 annually. At least 31 funded businesses have already emerged, many of which have scaled beyond the start-up stage.
The programme provides training, mentorship, funding opportunities and incubator services to prepare students for Ghana’s entrepreneurial ecosystem. Prof. Owusu-Ansah noted the international recognition students are gaining, citing their recent participation in a hackathon in Kenya where they impressed seasoned investors.
The programme’s success has also attracted institutions seeking partnerships to expand funding and support for student-led ventures.
Sharing her experience, Dr. Akua Asare-Ankomah, a past participant, recounted how her curiosity about entrepreneurship among clinicians evolved into an innovation that is now at the stage of potential patent registration.
“I joined the course because I wanted to understand what entrepreneurship among clinicians and health workers really looks like,” she said.
With seed funding and mentorship, she developed a prototype currently in trials and has showcased her work at the Africa Health Collaborative Convening in 2024 and the first AFYA Hackathon in 2025. Her journey has now come full circle, as she serves as a facilitator for the SBS Programme at KNUST, mentoring new students to develop their entrepreneurial ideas.