24 African Health Supply Chain Innovators Emerging as Market Leaders

...Reaching 50,000 Providers Across 33 Countries

Salient Advisory, a healthcare consulting firm funded by the Gates Foundation, has released a new market intelligence report highlighting 24 top health supply chain innovators in Africa. The report, titled "Leading Innovations Enabling Health Product Access in Africa," reveals that innovators are emerging as significant market leaders despite challenging economic conditions and declining investment in the African tech sector.

With an average of 10 years of operation, these innovators have forged partnerships with over 100 manufacturers and 75 public health institutions. They now reach approximately 50,000 healthcare providers, delivering essential health products directly to millions of consumers. Notably, Kasha, which secured Series B investment last year, has grown its health technology platform and reported record annual revenues exceeding $50 million in 2023, according to Salient Advisory’s research.

Like Kasha, innovators that offer digitally-enabled Order and Inventory Management services to hospitals, clinics, pharmacies and drug shops appear dominant amongst the leading companies, making up 13 of the 24 featured innovations, with operations in 30 countries. Four leading Online Pharmacies are reaching nearly 10 million customers and generating median annual revenues of nearly $9M. The other categories featured are innovations in Product Protection and Visibility, Medical Drone Delivery and Data Analytics.

While leading innovators now appear positioned to deliver more substantive impact, they require targeted engagement from governments, donors, industry and global health institutions to transform access for unserved populations and improve the cost-effectiveness of care. To leverage leading innovators’ models in driving increases in access, governments, industry, donors and global health agencies should: simplify regulatory pathways; explore innovators’ ability to generate cost- savings for health systems, pursuing partnerships when the evidence is strong; and evolve contracting and payment systems to enable innovators to partner in healthcare delivery systems at larger scale.

The 24 leading innovators featured are (in alphabetical order): Chefaa, DrugStoc, Field Inc, Figorr, Grinta, HealthPlus, Kasha, LifeBank, Maisha Meds, Meditect, mPedigree, MYDAWA, Pendulum, PharmaSecure, Remedial Health, RxAll, Sobrus, Sproxil, Talamus Health, VIA Global Health, Viebeg, Wingcopter, Yodawy and Zipline.

Speaking on the launch of the report, Yomi Kazeem, Engagement Manager at Salient Advisory, commented: ‘’The findings underscore the remarkable resilience and growing impact of African supply chain innovators. Having tracked healthtech startups for many years, the emergence of a group of leading innovators is exciting to report. Local and global public health communities must increasingly recognize and leverage the innovators in developing reliable and resilient health supply chains.”

Ann Allen, Senior Program Officer at Gates Foundation, commented: “Technology-enabled innovations have the potential to help reverse long-running challenges in African health systems, while creating local jobs and strengthening local health markets. The report confirms innovators are increasingly positioned to deliver on this promise. However, there is more to be done as leveraging these innovations to truly transform cost-effective access for millions of unserved Africans will require concerted efforts from governments, industry and global health agencies alike.”

To download the full market intelligence report, please click here.