Featured Scientist: Dr William Vambe
Shaping African AI with Purpose
Dr William Tichaona Vambe’s work is guided by a simple but powerful principle: technology must serve people, not the other way around. A Computer Science scholar and Senior Lecturer at Walter Sisulu University, his research focuses on building artificial intelligence and digital systems that are locally relevant, ethically grounded, and inclusive by design.
In addition to his role as a South African BRICS delegate, Dr Vambe’s work spans research, entrepreneurship, and science engagement. He is a winner of the African Science Entrepreneurship Business Canvas Model Pitching Programme, a Best Presenter Runner-Up at the IEEE ICTAS Conference, and a contributor to DHET-accredited journal publications, conference proceedings, and a book chapter addressing South Africa’s digital divide.
Dr Vambe also plays an active leadership role in the scientific community through conference appointments, participation in technical programme committees, and invited talks. Notable recent engagements include:
Guest Speaker, Pitch_Colloquium – AI & Extended Reality (XR) in Learning and Teaching, THENSA & DHIK, 21 October 2025
Final Speaker, ISA iTAGe 2025 – Talking Across Generations on Education, under the UNESCO MGIEP iTAGe Framework (Germany), 17 October 2025
Beyond his research outputs, Dr Vambe remains deeply engaged with the intellectual foundations of his field. He is currently reading books and journal scholarship on AI grounded in African contexts, including work by Dr Mark Nasila and Prof A.G. Mutambara. These perspectives, he notes, apply the same lens that shaped his NITheCS Colloquium presentation, “Coding Our Now and Future: Africa’s Voice, Values and Vision in AI.”
Reflecting on the challenges facing AI development on the continent, Dr Vambe challenges the assumption that Africa lacks capacity. “Many Africans are already working for major global AI companies,” he argues. “We have the skills and the resources. What we lack are enabling policies and enough people willing to build AI solutions that are tailored for African realities.”
In response, his approach centres on strengthening local policy conversations, supporting African-led research and datasets, and advocating for technologies designed with Africa’s social, cultural, and economic contexts at their core—ensuring that innovation is shaped from within, rather than imported wholesale.
As a NITheCS Featured Scientist, Dr William Tichaona Vambe represents a generation of scholars shaping global technologies from African perspectives, ensuring that the future of AI is not only advanced, but equitable and grounded in context.
