Tomorrow Foundation's founder support for the development of mPharma

October 2021 Ghana

Tomorrow Foundation's founder prides herself on her newest capital investment into mPharma, one of the fastest-growing health tech startups in Africa and ranked as the most promising digital healthcare start-up in Africa by CB Insights. mPharma was founded in Ghana by Gregory Rockson (CEO), Daniel Shoukimas (CPO), and James Finucane (CTO) and has since 2013 been managing prescription drug inventory for pharmacies and their suppliers in emerging markets. 

mPharma offers innovative solutions for hospitals, pharmacies and patients to address the issue of faulty inventory management and financing, and thereby improving patients' access to necessary high-quality medicine. They provide access to a network of high-quality chronic disease medicine at sustainable prices, ensuring that the shelves in the pharmacies rarely are empty. So far, more than 400,000 patients have saved money on their pharmacy bills thanks to mPharma. 

With a presence in eight African countries, mPharma is the most geographically diversified healthcare provider on the continent. mPharma is now the biggest provider of 'buy, pay later' programs for the pharmaceutical industry in Africa with more than 50% of the world's 15 largest pharmaceutical companies being clients. 

Apart from this, these are some of the various benevolent initiatives mPharma has launched: 

  • Generally lowering drug prices for people with long-term conditions
  • Breast cancer campaigns in collaboration with Roche 
  • HPV campaigns 
    • Cervical cancer program to make the HPV test the primary mode of screening in Africa.
    • Integrated HPV test and treat service into one of Africa's biggest banks' corporate wellness programs and paid 200 female employees to get their first HPV test.
    • The 10,000 Women Campaign, offering free HPV vaccines in Ghana and Nigeria (read more further down) 
  • Mutti Doctor, a digital primary care service that can transform any pharmacy into a primary care provider with a care coordination team that consists of a doctor, nurse, pharmacist and lab technician for only $ 750 monthly. The Mutti pharmacies are currently present in Ghana, Nigeria, Kenya, Zambia, Malawi, Rwanda, and Ethiopia. 
  • Launching of a Patient Support Program for Pfizer in Nigeria, covering their critical care drug portfolio. It has now expanded to cover Ghana too after exceeding the annual patient targets within the quarter Q3. 
  • Patient Support Program for Asthma in Kenya with Boehringer Ingelheim (yet to be launched).
  • Diabetes Test and Treat program with nearly 2000 patients enrolled (Sanofi)
  • Molecular diagnostics laboratory network of 30 laboratories
  • Furthermore, the government of Gabon recently announced that it had contracted mPharma as the technical partner to rebuild its public sector drug supply chain infrastructure with an investment of 5 Billion FCA from the Gabon Sovereign Wealth Fund. With a successful launch in Gabon, mPharma aims to showcase Gabon as an example of what private sector management of a Central Medical Store can do for medicine affordability and availability in public hospitals which could serve as a model for other African countries with Sovereign Wealth Funds. 

 

The future of mPharma 

One month ago, mPharma launched a digital primary care service called Mutti Doctor. Mutti Doctor steps up the game of virtual video consultations with a multi-functional medical diagnostic device that serves the purpose of being both a digital stethoscope, otoscope to examine the ear, thermometer, and also has an illuminated examination camera. The digital examinations are supported inside mPharma's mutti pharmacies by a licenced community nurse while doctors can be consulted remotely. This service increases the accessibility because it is generally located much closer to the patients' homes, finally leading to patients achieving better health outcomes. 

Another major victory for the company, and for the people, is, that mPharma entered the market in Uganda by acquiring Vine Pharmacy which they intend to bring back to its former days of glory where it held the position of the biggest retail pharmacy chain in Uganda. 

Going forward and re-entering the world post-COVID-19, it's mPharma's CEO, Gregory Rockson's belief that their fast-moving company also can have a major role in helping African governments emerge from the pandemic by supporting them in building a resilient public health care system. 

 

With Tomorrow Foundation as an investor in mPharma, we are sincerely looking forward to supporting their future initiatives regarding optimizing access to high quality, affordable and timely health care in Africa, as we see this as a necessary part of the solution to successfully bridge the gap.  

The team behind mPharma deserves all our humble respect for the positive impact they have on the health of African people, meanwhile still continuing to grow their revenue year by year, attracting high-profile institutional and private investors and benefitting from a top of the class board of directors.

mPharma serves as a brilliant example that social entrepreneurship can have a genuine impact on real people in need and still be profitable. With a firm hope of a brighter future, we envision that this type of company that place people before profit will drastically help shape the world of a better Tomorrow. 

Read more about mPharma here:  https://mpharma.com/