Dr Winfred Onyas

Dr Winfred Onyas is an Associate Professor of Marketing and chairs the Shadow College of Business Leadership Team Board. She also leads the Consumption, Markets and Society Research Group.

Winfred’s work centres on agential inequalities in markets, exploring how individuals navigate barriers such as limited resources, illiteracy, and institutional voids. Her research spans digital ecosystems, innovation, and sustainable development, with major projects on digital gender inequalities and frugal innovation in Africa. Winfred sits on the editorial board of the Journal of Cultural Economy and has published in a range of world-class journals, including Marketing Theory, Industrial Marketing Management, International Marketing Review, Journal of Marketing Management, and Journal of Rural Studies. She has secured external research funding from UK Research and Innovation/Global Challenges Research Fund and the British Academy (International Partnership & Mobility Scheme). As part of her research impact work, Winfred co-founded CODE https://www.coalitionfordigitalequality.com/ and Digi-Equal Africa: https://digi-equal.coalitionfordigitalequality.com/. These initiatives focus on strengthening digital gender equality in Africa’s digital ecosystem by addressing the structural barriers that limit women’s participation, visibility, and agency.

Winfred’s research focuses on market studies, digital ecosystems, innovation, and sustainable development. Her work explores agential inequalities in markets and society, and how actors navigate challenges such as illiteracy, limited access to resources, and institutional voids to participate in markets. Her work examines agential inequalities in markets and society, exploring how actors navigate challenges such as illiteracy, limited resources, and institutional voids to participate in markets. She has led interdisciplinary research and network projects on digital gender inequalities and frugal innovation in Africa in collaboration with academic and industry partners. Alongside this, her research has also examined the construction of coffee value chains and markets.

Research impact

Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC) Impact Acceleration Account 

• 2025-2026: Principal Investigator, DIGI-EQUAL Africa: Tackling Gender Stereotypes in The African Digital Space

• 2023: Co-Investigator, Technological Solutions to Tackle Water Shortage and Low School Attendance in Rural Uganda

External funding

• 2020-2021: Principal Investigator, UK Research and Innovation/Global Challenges Research Fund: Bridging the Digital Gender Divide to Stimulate Growth in African Digital Economies (2020-2021). The network project was led by the University of Leicester in partnership with Makerere University Business School, the University of Ghana, Africa Technology Business Network, and Gender and Policy Insights along with five digital stakeholders in Uganda and Ghana. For details about the project, visit the Coalition for Digital Equality (CODE) - a key output of the project - on https://www.coalitionfordigitalequality.org/

• 2016-2019: Principal Investigator, British Academy (International Partnership & Mobility Scheme): Exploring the Nature and Prospects of Frugal Innovations in Uganda. A partnership between the University of Leicester and Makerere University Business School.

Onyas, W.I., (2023). Enacting overlapping exchanges to address market concerns: Evidence on sustainable and conventional coffee markets in Uganda. Marketing Theory, 23(3), pp.411-435.

Dada, O.L. and Onyas, W.I. (2021). Negotiating agency in mitigating franchisee failure: A critical discourse analysis. Industrial Marketing Management, 98, pp.1-16.

Aly, H.F., Mason, K. and Onyas, W. (2021). The institutional work of a social enterprise operating in a subsistence marketplace: Using the business model as a market-shaping tool. Journal of Consumer Affairs, 55(1), pp.31-58.

Onyas W.I., McEachern MG and Ryan AM (2018) Co-constructing sustainability: Agencing sustainable coffee farmers in Uganda. Journal of Rural Studies. 61: 12-21.  

Mwiti F.G. and Onyas W.I. (2018). Framing hybrid exchanges in subsistence contexts. International Marketing Review. Special Issue on Africa Rising. Volume 25(4):601-618 

Onyas W.I. and Ryan AM. (2015). Agencing markets: actualizing ongoing market innovation. Industrial Marketing Management. Special Issue on Market Innovation Processes. 44:.13-21.

Onyas W.I. and Ryan AM. (2015). Exploring the brand's world-as-assemblage: the brand as a market shaping device. Journal of Marketing Management. 31(1-2), 141-166.

Onyas WI and Ryan AM (2014) Articulating matters of concern in markets: (en)tangling goods, market agencies and overflows in Geiger, S., Kjellberg, H., Harrison, D. and Mallard, A.(eds) Concerned Markets. Economic ordering for multiple values. Edward Elgar. 

Winfred welcomes supervision requests from students interested in market studies, digital ecosystems, frugal innovation, and sustainable development.

Current PhD supervision

Farah Mneimne: Enabling Organisational Resilience in Times of Crisis: Frugal Innovation as a Dynamic Capability.

Sara Kabil: The dynamics of grassroot innovation scaling: Investigating the impact of strategic niche activities and power relations on the scaling process.

PhD completions

Lubica Mueller: Agencing Farmers in the Philippine Coffee Actor-Networks.

William Trevor: A Critical Examination of an Emerging Paradigm of Innovation Management: A Case Study of Frugal Innovation in the Agrifood Sector in sub-Saharan Africa and its Role in Furthering Sustainable Rural Development.

Alejandro Ramirez: Crafting Culinary Identities: The Artistry and Creativity of Technology Design and Implementation in Fine Dining - An Actor-Network Theory Perspective.

Ebenezer Ayeah: How the Ideology of Customer Sovereignty Shapes Customer-Oriented Practices in the Call Centre.

Winfred’s teaching spans undergraduate and Master’s levels, covering modules such as Marketing Management and Practice, Responsible Marketing, and Consumers, Brands and Digital Marketing. She has also taught Strategies for International Marketing, Services Marketing, and Introduction to Marketing. Her teaching is research‑led and informed by current scholarship, blending theory and practice to strengthen students’ critical thinking and strategic insight. She supervises dissertations at both undergraduate and postgraduate levels, and her practice is student‑centred, with a focus on developing responsible, reflective marketing professionals. Winfred has also led Module 4: Vision, Mission and Values on the Help to Grow programme (2022–2026).

She serves as an external examiner at the Open University.

Selected conference papers

Mueller, L., Onyas WI, Higgins, M. Roots of Struggle (2025). Exploring the Resilience, Agency, and Market Inclusion of Filipino Farmers. 8^th Interdisciplinary Market Studies Workshop. Stockholm School of Economics.

Onyas WI, Dawa S, Acheampong G.  (2023). Debunking gender stereotypes to enhance female participation in the African digital economy. 7^th Interdisciplinary Market Studies Workshop. University of Edinburgh.

Mueller L, Onyas WI and Higgins M. (2022). Heartfelt design: Reshaping the imperfect Philippine coffee market. European Group for Organizational Studies. WU Vienna, Austria.

Ryan AM and Onyas WI (2021). Purposeful entanglement between social values and economic orders in the shaping of social innovation markets. International Market Studies Workshop virtual conference. University of Grenoble.

Onyas WI, Sojourner G. and Nakintu M. (2020). Building portfolio synergies and ecosystems to support sustainable frugal innovations. 7th biennial virtual International Symposium Cross-Sector Social Interactions. University of Limerick, Limerick.

Mwiti F and Onyas WI. (2020). Exploring the linkages between embeddedness culture and innovations in Subsistence Marketplaces. Subsistence Marketplaces Virtual Conference. Loyola Marymount University, Los Angeles, USA.

Onyas WI, Dawa S., Mulira F. and Namatovu R. (2017). Fostering sustainable frugal innovation in Uganda. International Conference ""Frugal Innovation for Sustainable Global Development"". Centre for Frugal Innovation in Africa. Leiden, the Netherlands.

Onyas WI and Namatovu R. (2017). Exploring frugal innovation spaces as agencements. Globalization and Socio-Economic Development. Workshop on Private Governance Globalization and Market Dynamics. Society for the Advancement of Socio-Economics conference Lyon, France.

Onyas WI and Mulira F. (2017). Building entrepreneurial capacity in the mobile money agencement. Lancaster-Stockholm Market Studies Workshop. Stockholm School of Economics, Sweden. 

PhD Marketing. Fellow of the Higher Education Academy. PGCert in Academic Practice. MBA (Marketing). BCom (Hons).