Information and Communication Technologies for Development

We met our IRD contact today. Aamir Khan took us to lunch, and we discussed the project, as well as ICT for health in general. We had a lot of interesting discussions about how to get funding for such projects in general. Aamir Khan is of the opinion that the best way to get funding is to figure out the problem you want to solve (Multi-drug Resistant TB, for example), and propose a solution based on that, which specifies some new technologies you will develop along the way. He hasn't seen funding for core technologies just based on their merits - the best way to get funding is to do so by solving a tangible problem.