By Stanley Ugagbe
Prime Minister of Canada, Justin Trudeau has eulogized a Nigerian pharmacist, Adebayo Alonge for co-developing an Artificial Intelligence that detects fake and spoilt drugs.
The Nigerian Canadian News gathered that Alonge had in the competition; “Hello Tomorrow Global Challenge” held in Paris competed with about 4500 other people from around the world in 2019. The competition featured contenders from about 119 countries.
Alonge Adebayo made it to the final with 80 others and he eventually won the competition with a grand prize of €100,000.
Official records have it that he is the first African to win the contest. He was awarded for his novel nanoscanner called RxScanner, a technology that instantly detects fake drug, making it the world’s first go-to tech for combating substandard drugs.
Reports have it that Alonge Adebayo was once a victim of fake drug; an incident that almost took his life. He is the co-founder and CEO of RxAll – a U.S based deep tech Start-up firm.
According to Wikipedia, “Adebayo Alonge attended King’s College, Lagos, from 1996–2002. He studied pharmacy at University of Ibadan, and graduated with first class honor in 2008.He had Master of Business Administration degree (with focus on Strategy and Finance) at the Lagos Business School – Pan-Atlantic University and holds Master of Advanced Management from Yale University – Yale School of Management. He is an alumnus of Hitotsubashi University Graduate School of International Corporate Strategy, and currently studying Master of Public Administration (Mason Program) at Harvard Kennedy School – Harvard University.
Adebayo Alonge served in the following capacity as: Medical representative of Sanofi between November 2009 and September 2010; Contract Pharmacist at Global HIV/AIDS Initiative; Medical representative of Roche (now Swiss Pharma Nigeria) from September 2010 to October 2012; Market development Intern(Pharma Ingredients) of BASF between July 2013 to October 2013; Market Developer at BASF West Africa from August 2014 to August 2015; Director of business development at Lusoy Investments Limited between April 2012 to October 2017; and Consultant at The Boston Consulting Group from November 2015 to October 2017.
In 2016, Alonge co-founded RxAll Inc., with the intention of preventing patients from counterfeit medicines and provide a way for them to authenticate their drugs. The RxAll team has essentially three co-founders, Alonge as the Chief executive official, Amy Kao as the Chief marketing officer, and Wei Liu as the Chief technology officer.
Adebayo Alonge is the recipient of the following awards: Adekunle Ajasin Award for Academic Excellence in 2008; Mandela Washington Fellowship from the United States Department of State for outstanding contributions to business and entrepreneurship in Africa (2014); Global Social Venture Award (2016) from InnovateHealth, Yale; 2018 China Award for Best DeepTech Platform in the World; Winner, Deep Tech Award with a €100,000 prize, 2019; Grand Winner & Digital Health Winner, Hello Tomorrow Global Challenge 2019; Young Innovator – YouWin!; Regional finalist, Hult Prize Global Case Competition; and awards in person from Barack Obama (ex-US president) and Justin Trudeau (prime minister of Canada)”.
