Krish Chetty is a Senior Research Manager at the Equitable Education and Economies Division of the HSRC. He holds a Masters Qualification in Knowledge and Information Management from the University of Stellenbosch) and is a PhD candidate in the Computing Science Department at Nelson Mandela University. His PhD study concentrates on developing partnership strategies for South African and Chinese incubators and accelerators to accelerate entrepreneurship development across the African continent. His research interests lie in the social applications of smart technologies that contribute to eradicating poverty, inequality and unemployment. He previously worked in the HSRC’s BRICS Research Centre, representing South Africa in several BRICS academic events. Prior to joining academia, he worked as a Data Architect for various South African financial institutions, including the Financial and Fiscal Commission, First National Bank and Allan Gray.

Dr Sello Manoto is a Director of Research Infrastructures, Human and Infrastructure Capacity Development (HICD), at the National Research Foundation (NRF), South Africa. Dr. Manoto graduated with his PhD in Biomedical Sciences from the University of Johannesburg in 2014. He also completed the Strategic management development programme (Stellenbosch University-2024) and the Management Advancement programme (WITS business school-2018). Before his current role, he was a Senior Researcher at the Council for Scientific and Industrial Research (CSIR), Pretoria Area, South Africa. His duties at CSIR include the definition and execution of R&D projects, to support the group’s R&D programme and; the development of project proposals for the Parliamentary Grant and external funding.