Programme Thesis
The Mozilla Foundation Fellows Program 2026 funds up to 10 visionary technologists, researchers, and advocates who are building concrete alternatives for a more trustworthy, equitable, and people-centered tech future. It exists to support leaders from the Global Majority who create open, auditable, and community-serving technologies—countering corporate power and systemic harms—through a 12-month fellowship with stipend, project budget, and access to Mozilla’s global platforms.
Selection Criteria
- Eligibility: Open to all countries where Mozilla can legally make grants; must be able to receive ACH/wire from the US; must be legally able to enter a grant agreement with Mozilla Foundation (US 501c3). Track I Embedded Fellows must be located in Kenya, South Africa, Brazil, MENA region, Mexico, UK, US, or EU.
- Fit: Does your experience match the chosen track (Track I Embedded or Track II Independent)? Are you ready for this opportunity?
- Project: Do you outline a compelling project that advances a better tech future and can be realistically executed in 12 months? For Embedded Fellows, the project must compellingly address the Host Organization’s identified issue.
- Values: Does your approach embody technology 'built with care, powered by people'? Does it align with Mozilla’s mission of openness, transparency, and serving people over profit?
- Impact: Will the project create concrete demonstrations of better tech futures—tools, platforms, creative works, or innovations that others can build upon?
- Openness: Commitment to releasing code and non-confidential content under open licenses, working in the open, and regularly sharing and documenting work.
Past Winners / Cohort Profiles
Mozilla Fellows have included over 200 changemaking technologists, researchers, creators, and advocates. Past cohorts feature individuals embedded with civil society organizations (e.g., Amnesty International, Derechos Digitales) and independent innovators working on AI auditing, privacy tools, climate justice, and open infrastructure. Named examples from the broader Mozilla Fellows network include Tawana Petty (data justice), Brandi Geurkink (ad tech accountability), and Katarzyna Szymielewicz (digital rights). The 2026 cohort will be up to 10 leaders, with a strong emphasis on Global Majority representation.
Ideal Candidate Fingerprint
The platonic ideal applicant is a mid-career technologist or researcher from the Global Majority who has already built open-source tools or platforms that demonstrably advance user privacy, AI accountability, climate justice, creator rights, data democratization, or open internet infrastructure. They have a clear, feasible 12-month project that produces a public good—code, policy frameworks, or educational resources—and a track record of working in the open, collaborating across sectors, and centering underserved communities.
Recommended Framing
Eniola should frame his application around the 'Democratizing Data' and 'Building Open Infrastructure' focus areas, positioning his open-source tools (TOPOLOGIX, neurocascade, ergofluids) as community-owned, transparent alternatives to proprietary AI and pharmacological models. His LMIC background and independent research path strengthen the narrative of building technology that serves people—especially in African contexts where addiction treatment and drug-resistance prediction are underfunded. He should emphasize how his work enables non-experts to audit AI systems (e.g., TOPOLOGIX’s sequence-only approach bypasses expensive structure data) and how his open-code ethos (all preprints, code on GitHub, pre-registered studies) embodies Mozilla’s values of care and accountability.
Watch Out
None. Eniola meets all eligibility criteria: he is from Nigeria (Global Majority), can receive wire transfers, is legally able to enter a US grant agreement, and his independent researcher status fits Track II. His M.Sc. enrollment does not conflict with the fellowship commitment. The only minor risk is that his deep domain expertise in addiction neuroscience may not immediately map to Mozilla’s broad tech-and-society framing, but this can be mitigated by emphasizing the open-science and democratization angles.