Investing in Innovation Africa (i3), a pan-African initiative designed to help African health-tech startups scale and commercialise their offerings, announced four strategic partnerships between leading African health-tech innovators and global, regional, and private sector partners at its fourth annual Access to Markets (A2M) event.
Funded by the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation and sponsored by MSD, Cencora, Endless Foundation, HELP Logistics, Sanofi’s Global Health Unit and Chemonics, i3 is dedicated to facilitating the commercialisation of promising early- and growth-stage companies.
The initiative announced four groundbreaking deals at its fourth flagship A2M event, a two-day gathering designed to connect Africa’s most promising e-health companies with strategic partners.
The new transformative deals will focus on supporting chronic disease care, expanding patient access to affordable and safe medicines, and strengthening pharmacy regulation through digital and artificial intelligence systems.
Dawa Mkononi and NMB Bank signed a working capital deal to expand interest-free credit to pharmacies, drug shops and health facilities across Tanzania; while MYDAWA and Endless Health signed a partnership to co-design, test, and document a scalable, digital-first model of hypertension and diabetes care for low-and middle-income patients.
Meditect has received debt financing from Boehringer Ingelheim, supporting the company’s mission to expand access to affordable, safe and authentic, high-quality pharmaceuticals across Sub-Saharan Africa; and Sproxil and the Pharmacy Council of Nigeria (PCN) signed a Memorandum of Collaboration to support pharmacy regulation in Nigeria through digital and artificial intelligence systems.
These deals build on i3’s proven track record of deal facilitation for African health startups, having generated over 760 bespoke introductions, resulting in 165 partnerships, pilots and Memorandums of Understanding valued at over US$19 million.
As of April 2026, i3 innovators have served over 6.85 million patients and tracked, protected and distributed over 209 million health products, demonstrating i3’s growing impact on patients’ access to essential care and safe medicines across Africa.
