Nov 2, 2020
How a KNUST Graduate Became an MIT Recognized Inventor Without Ever Attending MIT
Isaac Sesi’s name is listed under the Inventors Category on the MIT Technology Review Innovators Under 35 page. At the time he got on that list, he was 26 years old (the youngest of the 9 member cohort). Certainly, not everyone on the list is affiliated with MIT, but Sesi happens to be the only one from Africa.
I caught up with him recently to chat about his journey and here is the fun-fact I discovered — 4 years after graduation, Isaac Sesi has still not picked up his university degree from KNUST, even though he drives by the school almost every morning to work.
How was growing up for you?
Both of my parents had a thing for agriculture — my dad grew cocoa on a farmland 80 miles from home and my mum had a vegetable home garden, but my passion was strongly for anything electronic. I was that child who would break apart almost any gadget that came within my arm’s reach. Being an African child, I sure got my fair share of the African whippings from those wreckages.
In high school, I found friends who were equally interested in understanding how electronic equipment operated. Through our explorations and experimentations, we built a dishwasher, alarm systems, and worked on some other interesting projects.
Those experiences strengthened my focus on engineering as a field of interest. I strongly desired to be an MIT electrical engineering and computer science student, but the financial constraints at home held me back — I couldn’t even afford the SAT test to begin with. I applied to attend KNUST and taught science in a preparatory school to raise money before enrolling.
What were your expectations when you were going into university?
To be honest, I thought I was going to do a lot of crazy things like building robots, cars e.t.c — those were my naive expectations. Over the course of time, I observed the program was more skewed towards power than electronics.
I got really disappointed and decided to take some online courses to learn programming and any other thing I found relevant to my interest in electronics. At a point, I realised that Coursera had online courses for some of the courses I was taking in class — I followed those to help me understand lectures that I found difficult to comprehend.
How did you combine taking online courses along with your regular lectures?
What I did was to go to class, take the topic we learnt, and get back to my room to find the same course online to follow. I realised that the content that was available online was so much richer than what I was learning in class, so that kept me digging for more.
Typically, lectures would have a couple of hours between them, so I would log into my Coursera account in between lectures and continue learning. I tried a lot of times to learn ahead of the curriculum. I kept learning because it simply made a lot more sense on Coursera.
At night, I would practice writing code, building a circuit or something else, and those took me deep into the night.
How did you apply what you were learning from the online courses?
Joining the Creativity Group at KNUST helped me to have a community I could relate with and collaborate with. We worked on amazing projects, and in my third year, I got introduced to the concept of social enterprises.
I participated in a number of competitions and gained some exposure through them. It was through one of those competitions that I met a medical science student who was interested in agriculture — we partnered to work on a project and that merged my passion for engineering with agriculture, the passion my parents have always had from the time I was growing up.
Were you thinking entrepreneurially throughout all those experiences?
I had always been entrepreneurial, dating back especially to my time in senior high school. My dad had lost his job so out of necessity, I started selling pen drives and a number of different things to keep me going.
I realised there were even more opportunities when I got into university. There were no places at that time to purchase electronic components, so I learnt to build a website and created an online shop for the ordering, purchasing and delivery of electronic components — it was and is still called Invent Electronics.
When I did my internships as an undergrad, all the internships made me resolve to become an entrepreneur. I felt I was only performing tasks assigned to me when I felt there was more I could offer beyond those tasks; the more I interned, the more my resolve to be an entrepreneur became stronger.
How did your work on the GrainMate get recognized by the MIT Technology Review?
After my National Service at KNUST’s UITS (University Information Technology Services), I worked as a research engineer at the Agricultural and Biosystems Engineering Department of the school, leading a project that researched the moisture meter.
A USAID related project in Ghana saw the moisture meter and took a big bet on us — to have us produce 120 units of the GrainMate in 3 months. We ended up overshooting the timeline with a couple more months — what I discovered was that building hardware for oneself is a totally different thing from building at scale. There were many tough calls throughout those months, but those were some of the greatest lessons and experiences that kickstarted Sesi Technologies.
I was nominated by a friend for the MIT Technology Review Innovators Under 35 List for 2019. After going through a multi-stage interview and shortlisting process which included having to get recommendations from all over the world to attest to the work I was doing, I was selected into the 2019 cohort.
What Are Your Thoughts On Engendering Innovation In Universities In Africa?
Universities are incubating grounds where some of the world’s best ideas come up. However, what is happening now is that the people who try to innovate oftentimes get looked down upon because in most cases, they aren’t chasing grades and certificates as much as those who only have academic ambition.
We should have more competitions around innovation, bringing in people from industry to mentor student innovators, creating and properly managing funds to support student start-ups
Universities have a big role in fostering innovation and collaboration, with a lot of capacity to incentivise students to want to solve real-life problems. Universities have the ability to create environments for students to have resources to solve problems and play around with their ideas. When students see this working, more of them will become interested in innovation.
What final words do you have for any undergraduate reading this?
Focus on more than just school. Right from the time you get into school, start thinking about what to do after school. Build your social network while in school. Build relevant skills so that you don’t just take jobs for the sake of paying up bills. Finally, build your capacity.
Nominate an innovator for me to interview.
Charles Ofori Antipem.
