- In 2020, Lifestores Healthcare secured a $1 million seed round, followed by its recently disclosed $3 million pre-Series A fundraising.
- While startups that digitize the distribution network and distribution to suppliers like Lifestores have accomplished scale quicker and seen the most strong growth in Africa’s healthcare space in the last 12 months, telemedicine stays the standout healthcare provider that has experienced huge acceptance worldwide since the pandemic.
Health54 led the latter, oversubscribed round, with support from Aruwa Capital Management and other existing investors.
Bryan Mezue and Andrew Garza, the company’s co-founders, knew that anything they built needed to democratize access to high-quality, low-cost basic healthcare.
This was because they had previously worked on supply-chain and pharmaceutical-related projects. In 2017, they introduced Lifestores Healthcare, a chain of retail pharmacies that uses technology to offer a variety of services. Lifestores consist of two B2B components.
The OGApharmacy B2B marketplace comes first. It was introduced in 2020 during the pandemic and enables pharmacies and hospitals to pool their purchasing requirements.
Lifestores then negotiates with suppliers for the best deals on high-quality drugs, obtaining 10 to 20% discounts for them in the process. The other is an ERP system that may be used to manage operations by pharmacies and dispensaries.
More than 750 locations make up the network through which Lifestores Healthcare offers its services. The health-tech company claims to have a 25% monthly market growth and more than 10% of pharmacies in Nigeria as registered clients.
It hopes to boost its market share to 25% by 2023, which will result in a 4x expansion in patients reached, from 100,000 to 400,000.
According to a statement, Lifestores will release new technology characteristics as an aspect of its B2B services, including pharmacy management software, AI-driven predictive ordering, innovative credit services, and patient management projects, as well as open a new processing center in Lagos to support this expansion.
With trial projects in patient savings, care management, and pharmaceutical distribution, Lifestores will also broaden its B2C offerings.
While startups that digitize the distribution network and distribution to suppliers like Lifestores have accomplished scale quicker and seen the most strong growth in Africa’s healthcare space in the last 12 months, telemedicine stays the standout healthcare provider that has experienced huge acceptance worldwide since the pandemic.
