UGANDA – Uganda’s telemedicine and last-mile healthcare provider Rocket Health has closed a US$5 million series A funding round to accelerate its expansion across Uganda and into Kenya.

The funding round was led by Creadev, an evergreen investment fund backed by the Mulliez family of French entrepreneurs, with participation from early-stage African investors Grenfell Holdings and LoftyInc Capital Management.

Following the US$5 million Series A funding, the startup is set to scale its integrated digital health solution to more regions across the country and within East Africa over the next two years.

The telehealth aims to further pursue growth opportunities in West Africa in the long term.

Founded in 2012, Rocket Health is the number one telemedicine player in Uganda, offering an end-to-end healthcare experience to over 25,000 individual patients.

Its clientele base ranges from those calling in to have their children vaccinated to patients managing chronic illnesses.

The startup runs its own lab and pharmacy delivery services that enable it to control the delivery of products and services at the cost of US$3 consultation fee and US$1.5 for drug delivery.

Rocket Health offers online medical consultation, collection of samples and the delivery of medicines as well as a USSD service for those without internet connection.

The startup’s solution leverages technology to provide four integrated services involving 24/7 teleconsultations, medicine delivery, home sample collection for laboratory diagnostic testing and physical specialist clinic consultations.

Rocket Health Co-founder and CEO Davis Musinguzi expressed that the greater plan remains making healthcare easily accessible across Africa, a region with the highest disease burden in the world and the lowest patient-to-doctor ratio.

Rocket Health is on a quest to make quality primary healthcare accessible, affordable and convenient to achieve the best outcomes for as many Africans as possible,” said Dr. Davis Musinguzi.

The company has grown from a few thousand virtual consultations a year to about 400,000, propelled by the demand for remote healthcare during the pandemic.

Together, we shall build a sustainable digital healthcare value chain down to the last mile across Africa,” he further said.

12 insurance companies have so far signed up with the startup, giving it access to a pool of customers within Uganda and across East Africa since most of them have a regional presence.

On its roadmap to expansion, the startup aims to reduce the patient-doctor ratio in sub-Saharan Africa which currently stands at 0.23 doctors for every 10,000 people, against the best ratio of 84.2 doctors in the most developed countries.

There’s no way we’re going to build enough hospitals to be able to reach everybody with the health care that they need thus telemedicine really helps breach the gap of availability,” said Musinguzi.

Technology complemented with existing infrastructure will help to bridge the gap between many healthcare facilities and professionals centralized within the urban areas and people across the country who don’t get the benefits of these highly skilled individuals.

He added that the startup deals with clients in urban areas who love the convenience of services as well as companies buying subscriptions for casual workers who don’t qualify for corporate medical covers.

Earlier, Rocket Health partnered with Ada, a Berlin-based end-user self-assessment platform, to integrate artificial intelligence into its teleconsultations.

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