Halilu Targets Q1, 2024 to Put NASENI Products in Nigerian Market

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Emmanuel Addeh in Abuja

The Executive Vice Chairman of the National Agency for Science and Engineering Infrastructure (NASENI), Mr. Khalil Halilu, has said his vision for the agency’s products and technologies is to make them available in every household in Nigeria in the next few years.
Specifically, Halilu, who spoke during his maiden media interaction held at the agency’s headquarters in Abuja, noted that some tangible products emanating from NASENI’s prototypes will be in the market through technology transfer arrangements by the first quarter of 2024.

“Expect some products from NASENI’s R&D efforts in Nigeria market during the first quarter of 2024,” he said.
The NASENI chief executive said expectations from stakeholders of NASENI are very high as its activities must ensure transparency and focus to assist the agency deliver on its mandate.

According to him, part of his preoccupations since assuming office in September has been to give adequate attention to enhance the human capital potential of the agency through improved motivation for staff .
He explained that this is to enable them adjust to the transformations to be introduced in the system, stressing that stakeholders’ engagements and efforts to rebrand the agency around its products and technologies have remained top priorities.
The new NASENI chief executive said that the era of stacking prototypes on shelves had ended in the agency, saying that all its products and technologies must find their ways to the market.

“We are going to do a national rebranding to have footsteps of NASENI products in every household in the country. In the next few years this is what Nigerians should expect. We are no longer going to sit back to watch endless research and prototypes, keeping them on the shelves.
“We will take them to the market so that Nigerians can consume them. In fact, one of our next year plans is to have NASENI showrooms in key cities of the country.

“So that NASENI products are not things you view only on televisions but anyone could walk into our product outlets to experience those technologies that we’ve been talking about. And that is another way we will be expecting the public to hold us accountable as part of the promises we made,” he added.
Halilu further stated that he met lots of wonderful researches with over 150 products at prototypes level when he came on board.
“However, the commercialisation aspects are very little. Coming from my background of manufacturing and technology innovation, I believe the whole essence of doing research is to transform it into meaningful products that will have impacts on the economy.

“We are going to do this through technology transfer. Ever since we made the announcement to go into technology transfer particularly, especially the intention to have our products in the market, we have been receiving a lot of interests from private sector organisations looking out for our capacity,” he pointed out.
Halilu recalled that NASENI under him has rigorously been involved in lots of stakeholder engagements with many organisations showing interest in its activities for collaboration and products offtake.

One of such partners, he said was the Rural Electrification Agency (REA), for example, which had committed itself to a whopping $200 million procurement agreement with NASENI as long as the agency can produce the kind of products they consume.