Salient Advisory studies innovations in healthtech across the African continent. This newsletter summarizes the most interesting news we read each month. Submissions are welcome. Feel free to share.
Interested in learning how AI solutions are optimizing health supply chains? Join our upcoming webinars!
Salient is hosting 2 interactive webinars on April 14 and May 5 (both at 11 a.m ET) with live demonstrations of AI solutions addressing critical supply chain challenges across cost, service, and quality. These webinars are part of our ongoing project providing supply chain leaders with an efficient way to understand which AI use cases are positioned to generate practical impact in healthcare supply chains.
Each 1-hour webinar will feature an overview of the landscape of AI solutions addressing critical supply chain challenges related to cost, service, and quality and live demonstrations from 2 AI solution providers showcasing practical applications for health supply chains. Both webinars will also cover key adoption considerations—including data requirements, policy environment, funding models, and system architecture—and conclude with Q&A sessions, allowing supply chain leaders to engage directly with the featured solution providers. Interested? Register for the April 14 and May 5 webinar sessions!
A new blended finance vehicle targets the funding gap for Africa’s growth-stage health enterprises
The Health Finance Coalition (HFC) and Villgro Africa announced the Multiply Health Fund, a new blended finance vehicle designed to unlock capital for high-impact healthcare businesses across the continent. The fund combines HFC’s expertise in health financing and transaction structuring with Villgro’s venture-building and ecosystem experience, with the William Davidson Institute serving as a learning and impact partner. The fund aims to deploy funding strategically to reduce risk for commercial investors, targeting businesses that demonstrate both measurable impact and financial sustainability.
Governments are embedding digital approaches into the core of their health systems
In Nigeria, the Lagos State government is building on the success of the Pathway to Malaria Pre-Elimination and Digitization Project, delivered in partnership with Maisha Meds, which reached over 75,000 patients through more than 500 community pharmacies and Patent and Proprietary Medicine Vendors. The state is now applying the same digitally-enabled pharmacy infrastructure to tuberculosis (TB), deploying a new point-of-care TB diagnostic test through the same community network. The initiative’s goal is to replicate the success of the malaria project, which helped confirm Lagos’s status as a malaria elimination zone, as the state currently accounts for 9% of Nigeria’s TB burden with over 66% of cases going undiagnosed annually.
Kenya’s Ministry of Health plans to integrate AI into the country’s community health system through a collaboration with Causal Foundry, targeting three areas: health data management, clinical decision support, and primary care services. The initiative is designed to strengthen the decision-making capacity of Kenya’s network of more than 100,000 community health promoters, who currently rely on basic digital tools that limit real-time responsiveness.
Ethiopia launched the digitalization of its Public Health Emergency Management (PHEM) system, transforming the Electronic Public Health Emergency Management (ePHEM) system into a unified digital backbone for alert management, incident coordination, and resource tracking. The system will also leverage broad DHIS2 coverage and the Epidemic Intelligence from Open Sources platform to enable further real-time event surveillance, advancing the country’s health emergency preparedness.
Innovators secure strategic funding and a notable expansion
Eyone Medical, a Senegalese healthtech company, raised $1.7 million from Oyass Capital, the investment vehicle of Senegal’s sovereign wealth fund FONSIS. The funding supports the rollout of Senegal’s national Shared Single Patient Record, a government-backed initiative to digitize and centralize patient health data. Founded in 2011, Eyone builds interoperable software that enables real-time, secure sharing of patient records across facilities, with existing operations in Mali, Côte d’Ivoire, Cameroon, and Gabon.
ZanaAfrica, a Kenyan maternal health startup, secured €100,000 in non-dilutive growth funding from Germany’s Federal Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development as part of develoPPP Ventures‘ latest cohort. ZanaAfrica offers affordable menstrual and maternal care products alongside reproductive health education via a digital chatbot and hotline.
HelpMum Africa, a Nigerian healthtech social enterprise that uses mobile technology and e-learning to reduce maternal and infant mortality, has expanded operations to Ghana. Founded in 2017, HelpMum equips community birth attendants with digital tools in local languages, including vaccination tracking systems and training resources for safe deliveries.
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