Technology companies, biotech firms and world-class universities side-by-side in an area of gently rolling hills. The description could be about Silicon Valley or Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. It's also an image of the future in Kigali, Rwanda.
Carnegie Mellon University Africa is beginning its eighth year operating graduate programming and will be moving this fall to Kigali Innovation City, a public-private $2 billion development with a goal of creating more than 50,000 jobs in Kigali's Special Economic Zone.
"For the last seven years, I would say that the campus has been in startup mode," said CMU-Africa Director Vijayakumar Bhagavatula. "We were a brand new campus, starting from scratch in a completely new place, and learning a new culture. And kudos to the whole team that brought us to the position we are currently in. But now — we are ready for the next step."
