Kenyan e-health startup Ilara Health has closed a US$4.2 million pre-Series A funding round, combining both equity and debt funding, to help it scale operations and expand into new markets.
Founded in 2019 by Emilian Popa, Maximilian Mancini, and Sameer Afzal Farooqi, Ilara Health provides affordable diagnostic equipment to patients and healthcare providers in peri-urban areas.\
It has partnered with more than 3,000 clinics, and has also evolved to digitising operations and becoming a comprehensive solution for clinics, offering diagnostic tools, consumables, and pharmaceuticals.
Ilara Health’s US$4.2 million pre-Series A funding round was led by DOB Equity, with additional equity contributions from AAIC Investment, Angaza Capital, Black Pearl Investments, and Perivoli Innovations. It also featured the Philips Foundation and Boehringer Ingelheim, and brings Ilara Health’s total investment to US$11.7 million.
The startup will use the capital to scale its tech-enabled primary care model across Kenya, and later into other regions. The next 12 months will witness a dedicated focus on achieving substantial topline growth, expanding the partner clinics network, and introducing employee health services through B2B health and occupational services.