Egyptian startup DentaCarts has found itself a lucrative niche in serving the needs of dental clinics, and is planning to seize the opportunity by expanding into new markets.
Launched in 2017 by Ahmed Yehia and Saad Saleh, DentaCarts allows dentists and clinics to purchase dental products online, and has a catalogue of over 10,000 products from around 100 vendors.
The platform is a one-stop-shop marketplace that offers the widest range of authenticated products via authorised dealers, and has so far served over 1,500 dental clinics in Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, Kenya, and Ghana, and delivered more than 10,000 orders to secure revenues of over US$1.1 million.
Yehia told Disrupt Africa dental clinics were suffering from three main issues – fake products, limited access to market, and over-inflated prices. DentaCarts addresses all this, offering a wide range of authenticated products via authorized dealers.
“In addition, DentaCarts is deeply integrated with dental clinics management software, giving us a higher quality marketplace through deep data insights and analytics,” Yehia said.
The startup, which graduated for the American University in Cairo (AUC) Venture Lab in April 2018 and then took part in the Misk500 accelerator Riyadh, Saudi Arabia last year, now plans to expand on the back of raising US$450,000 in funding in December.
“DentaCarts currently has operations in Egypt and Saudi Arabia and is planning to expand to Kenya, Ghana, and South Africa,” said Yehia.
He said the startup, which makes money on sales commissions, digital services and subscription fees, is very different compared to other retail platforms. This is true even when it comes to the business model itself.
“DentaCarts is a multi-sided platform, the biggest network of nominated authorised dental suppliers and manufacturers from one side, and different customer segments like students, clinics, hospitals and colleges on the other side. Most of the other competitors in the market are agencies and stores with an online window,” Yehia said.
Its use of technology is also innovative.
“We believe in technology and how it changes people’s lives. We have an app and a plan for developing this app. We adopt marketing strategies based on single customer behaviour,” said Yehia.
