Egypt is teeming with an increasing number of e-health startups. Joining Africa’s most funded healthtech startup Vezeeta in its quest to conquer the Egyptian health-tech ecosystem is the Cairo-based e-pharmacy startup, Yodawy, which has announced it has raised $7.5 million in a Series B round led by Middle East Venture Partners (MEVP), Global Ventures, and Algebra Ventures. Egypt’s CVentures, P1 Ventures, and Athaal Angel Investors Group, also participated in the deal.
Yodawy plans to utilize the latest funds to launch new products and grow into other countries, according to a statement from the firm, which did not disclose the markets the startup is eyeing for expansion.
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Why The Investors Invested
Yodawy, according to Jad El Boustani, Managing Director of MEVP, is well positioned to automate the healthcare industry by seamlessly linking insurance companies, pharmacists, and patients. He also described Egypt as one of the most potential markets in the Middle East and North Africa (MENA), adding that MEVP plans to invest in further prospects there.
Karim Hussein, a Managing Partner at Algebra Ventures, Yodawy’s first backer, said, “Since our initial investment, Yodawy has created an innovative platform for delivering medication and managing claims throughout Egypt. Their unique digital services are essential to powering the next growth phase of health insurance in Egypt and similar emerging markets.”
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Amal Enan, Managing Director of Global Ventures, added, “Yodawy is the only player with both B2C and B2B insurance and pharma products and holds a leading market position with its end-to-end offerings. The business has been hugely successful in Egypt, and we are looking forward to supporting Yodawy as it enters new markets in the MENA region, and beyond.”
A Look At What The Startup Does
Yodawy, a digital pharmacy marketplace founded in 2018 by Karim Khashaba, Sherief El-Feky, and Yasser AbdelGawad, services all stakeholders in the healthcare ecosystem, including customers, insurance providers, pharmacies, doctors, and pharmaceutical/FMCG businesses. Customers can order drugs and other healthcare supplies using the portal. Through a real-time AI-powered approval engine, their pharmacy benefit management service connects pharmacies, health insurance providers, and patients.
Patients can take use of the service by registering their insurance cards, requesting medications, and receiving immediate approvals — after which the medications are delivered to their door.
Yodawy helps pharmacies increase their sales by allowing them to offer drugs online. It now has a network of over 3,000 pharmacies and has delivered over 800,000 orders. Eight of Egypt’s largest insurance firms, including Axa, MetLife, and MedNet, are among Yodawy’s insurance partners.
Doctors can issue digital prescriptions for their patients using a specific app (for doctors by Yodawy) that includes details like dosage, frequency, and duration. They can also use the software to develop prescription templates for the most common types of cases, which they can reuse to save time.
Yodawy e-pharmacy Yodawy e-pharmacy
Charles Rapulu Udoh
Charles Rapulu Udoh is a Lagos-based lawyer who has advised startups across Africa on issues such as startup funding (Venture Capital, Debt financing, private equity, angel investing etc), taxation, strategies, etc. He also has special focus on the protection of business or brands’ intellectual property rights ( such as trademark, patent or design) across Africa and other foreign jurisdictions.
He is well versed on issues of ESG (sustainability), media and entertainment law, corporate finance and governance.
He is also an award-winning writer