MIT Global Startup Labs is a multidisciplinary group of MISTI (MIT International Science and Technology Initiatives) that promotes development in emerging regions by cultivating young technology entrepreneurs. We develop curriculum materials, software technologies, platforms, and networks that enable undergraduate students in emerging regions to innovate in the area of information and communication technologies (ICTs).
Until 2013, MIT Global Startup Labs was known as MIT AITI. See our history for more information.
Most directly, MIT Global Startup Labs partners with universities in emerging regions and organizes advanced courses taught by MIT student/instructors. Our courses focus on mobile and Internet technologies, and are structured so that our students are awakened to the commercial possibilities of the technologies. Components of the course include detailed technical curriculum, funded business competitions, guest lectures, and networking events, all to help our students develop and realize their ideas.
Concurrent to its courses, MIT Global Startup Labs scales its impact by transferring teaching expertise to our partner universities so that they can incorporate components of our courses with little intervention. Furthermore, we create online course material so that we can reach students across the globe.
Since 2000, MIT Global Startup Labs has sent over 150 MIT instructors to teach over 2000 students in 14 countries, resulting in the creation of businesses and the addition of course offerings at our partner universities.
Managing Director, The Martin Trust Center for Entrepreneurship, MIT
Bill Aulet is the managing director of the Martin Trust Center for MIT Entrepreneurship at MIT and Professor of the Practice at the MIT Sloan School of Management. The center is responsible for entrepreneurship across all five schools at MIT starting with education but also extending well outside the class room with student clubs, conferences, competitions, networking events, awards, hackathons, student trips and most recently accelerators. Bill teaches at least three different classes per year (introductory to advanced entrepreneurship classes) in addition to his responsibilities of running the center. His work has won numerous awards and most recently, in April 2013, Bill was awarded the Adolf F. Monosson Prize for Entrepreneurial Mentoring at MIT.
Professor, MIT
Saman P. Amarasinghe is a Professor in the Department of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science at Massachusetts Institute of Technology and a member of the MIT Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence Laboratory . He received his BS in Electrical Engineering and Computer Science from Cornell University in 1988, and his MSEE and Ph.D from Stanford University in 1990 and 1997, respectively. His research interests are in discovering novel approaches to improve the performance of modern computer systems without unduly increasing the complexity faced by either application developers, compiler writers, or computer architects. He is also interested in creating appropriate information technologies for emerging countries. In that, he co-founded Lanka Internet Services (the first ISP in Sri Lanka), developed the TEK low bandwidth search engine and is involved with the Swara voice portal for citizen news journalism project.
Executive Director, The Legatum Center for Development and Entrepreneurship, MIT
Georgina Campbell Flatter, MEng (Oxon) SM, is a Senior Lecturer in Technological Innovation, Entrepreneurship, and Strategic Management at the MIT Sloan School of Management and the Executive Director of the MIT Legatum Center for Development and Entrepreneurship. In her role as Director and Lecturer, she works to create and implement educational programming and curricula for MIT students who are building and scaling sustainable ventures across the developing world. Flatter has been emerged in, and an active contributor to, MIT’s innovation ecosystem for over ten years through her roles as Executive Director of MIT’s Regional Entrepreneurship Acceleration Program (REAP), Director and Lecturer of the XPRIZE Lab @ MIT and, as a student, a researcher at the Langer Lab, and Managing Director of the MIT Clean Energy Prize. She has also led several innovation projects at the World Bank and worked as a research associate at a renewable fuels spinout from MIT. Flatter earned an MEng in materials science from the University of Oxford and an SM in Technology and Policy from MIT.
Cofounder and Principal Research Scientist, Aarno Labs
Michael Gordon is a Cofounder of computer security research firm Aarno Labs. Before Aarno Labs, Michael was a Research Scientist at MIT's Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence Laboratory (CSAIL) and the Director of MIT Global Startup Labs. His research interests focus on applying program analysis techniques to the areas of mobile application security and parallelization. He received his PhD from MIT in 2010 in Computer Science and Electrical Engineering. Michael is one of the original creators of the StreamIt programming language, employed throughout the world for research of high-performance data-streaming applications. Michael co-organized MIT's nextlab course, MIT's first incubator course focused on mobile technologies in emerging regions. Since 2007, Michael has organized and delivered mobile technologies incubator courses at universities across the world including Kenya, India, South Africa, Nigeria, and Rwanda. Michael also works as an independent mobile technologies consultant focused on developing countries, and he sits on the board of multiple African mobile startups.
MIT's Africa Internet Technology Initiative (AITI) was first envisioned by Paul Njoroge while attending the 1998 MIT Leadershape summer program after his sophomore year at MIT. Paul teamed up with fellow classmates Martin Mbaya and Solomon Assefa (also graduates of MIT Leadershape) to plan and launch the inaugural MIT AITI session (initial proposal). The founders of AITI realized that information and communication technologies can aid development. However, many African students are not exposed to a curriculum that focused on technologies appropriate to their environment. The founders had a vision that saw MIT students/instructors traveling to Africa to teach technology and promote development in African schools. Both parties would be benefit from the program. The MIT student/instructors would be enriched by a unique and challenging international experience, and the African students would be exposed to appropriate technologies that would help them to solve local problems and take advantage of local opportunities.
The founders developed the idea with the help of Professor Paul Gray (MIT EECS), President Emeritus of MIT. AITI was largely modeled on the successful MIT-CETI program in China and customized for Africa. In the summer of 2000, the program was piloted at Strathmore College in Kenya. Four MIT student/instructors (Paul Njoroge, Martin Mbaya, Andrew Nevins and Eric Traub) were part of the inaugural team. Each played an important role in taking the program from concept to reality. In 2000, tele-centers (Internet Cafes) were the dominant accessible form of ICT technology for most Africans. Thus, the team's curriculum centered on Java programming, HTML and the basics of UNIX. In addition, to promote entrepreneurship, leading executives from the computer industry in Kenya delivered guest lectures. Furthermore, students were required to work on a group project applying their newly acquired skills.
AITI was originally known as the Africa Internet Technology Initiative. In 2008, we changed our name to the Africa Information Technology Initiative. In 2011, AITI has organized courses in South Asia. To reflect our geographical expansion, AITI has again rebranded.
