Carepoint secures $10 million to make healthcare accessible for Sub-Saharan Africans
CarePoint, a pan-African healthcare startup, has raised a $10 million bridge round to advance its growth and make healthcare accessible and affordable to Africans.
Since COVID-19 hit the world in 2020, the global attitude towards the health sector has gotten better. Not only have more funds been channelled to the sector, but entrepreneurs are now turning to technology to bring healthcare services closer to the people.
Today, it’s not uncommon to see telemedicine, virtual care, drug delivery, outpatient care and many other services not obtainable (in Sub-saharan Africa). This is thanks to the investments trickling down to healthcare startups who are creating innovative solutions to make healthcare accessible more than ever.
Carepoint, a healthcare startup is the latest beneficiary of these investments. A brand under the Africa Health holdings portfolio, the pan-African health technology company runs a chain of healthcare facilities that are providing optimised patient-centred services to patients.
The startup which currently has a market in four African countries, (Nigeria, Kenya, Ghana and more recently Egypt) raised $10M to sustain its growth, improve its technology and create more products.
Founded by Dr. Sangu Delle after his prolonged career as an investor and CEO at Golden Palm investments, Carepoint is in the process of setting up telemedicine centres in their facilities and building micro-tech-enabled-clinics which targets the common people.
Speaking on the fundraise, Dr. Delle said, “the micro-clinics will have, at most, 12 employees, including a nurse. The patients will consult with doctors virtually. We are taking this route because we realised that as much as the mobile subscription in Africa is great and growing, if you look at it from an internet penetration perspective, so many people are still locked out because they cannot afford mobile data.”
“These clinics are a way of democratising access, and taking quality healthcare closer to the people, while making it affordable to them too,” Dr. Sangu Delle added.
In addition, patients would also access care virtually through CarePoint’s MyCareMobile app, which connects them to diverse services through teleconferencing, including consultations with their doctors, test results and 24-hour emergency response.
The startup currently has support from brands in Kenya, Ghana, Egypt and Nigeria: Lily Hospitals (Nigeria), Meridian Health Group (Kenya), Sahe (Egypt), Rabito Clinic Limited (Ghana), CarePoint Hospitals (Nigeria), and MyCareMobile (Ghana).
Delle stated that CarePoint will use part of the funding to build data science and AI teams to reinforce its technological resources, in addition to introducing new products.
The funding round was led by TRB Advisors. New and existing investors that took part in the bridge round include Delle, Breyer Capital, Beyond Capital Ventures (BVC), M3, Inc, Asia Pacific Land/ Natural World Limited, and Alan Waxman, who is Sixth Street Partners’ CEO.
Eva Yazhari, a general partner at BVC, commented, “CarePoint is at the forefront of creating solutions through its three core pillars of a scaled network of healthcare facilities, a strong technology backbone, and patient-centred care highlighted by the first Africa-focused healthcare data repository.”
“Beyond Capital Ventures is excited to participate in CarePoint’s Series B bridge round, and will work with Dr. Sangu Delle to scale an emerging technology-driven healthcare system in Africa… CarePoint is capturing demographic shifts to transform Africa into the next frontier for healthcare and transform health outcomes,” said Yazhari.