- GE and Santa Clara University's Miller Center for Social Entrepreneurship will graduate 14 social entrepreneurs who completed training and mentorship aimed at improving and accelerating maternal and/or child health outcomes in Africa
- This programme culminates in a "Premier Pitch" event where 14 finalists will present their respective enterprises to an audience of potential investors
Today, the GE healthymagination Mother and Child Programme will graduate 14 social entrepreneurs who completed training and mentorship aimed at improving and accelerating maternal and/or child health outcomes in Africa.
After a rigorous evaluation process, the social enterprises were selected to be in the first cohort of the healthymagination Mother and Child Programme. Throughout the programme, finalists attended a three-day, in-person workshop in Nairobi, Kenya, followed by a six-month online accelerator program that included weekly, in-depth mentoring from Silicon Valley-based executives and local GE business leaders. The program was designed to help the social entrepreneurs acquire business fundamentals, improve their strategic thought processes and articulate a business plan that demonstrates impact, growth and long-term financial sustainability.
"GE believes there is much for social enterprises and large businesses to learn from each other. As the center of the ecosystem, social entrepreneurs are key to building Africa's sustainable future," said Robert Wells, Executive Director of healthymagination. "The GE and Miller Center collaboration takes an innovative and highly practical approach to combatting this challenge, by providing social entrepreneurs with the skills and resources they need to expand the positive impact of their interventions."
This accelerator and mentorship programme culminates today in a "Premier Pitch" event taking place in Nairobi during which the 14 finalists will present their respective enterprises to an audience of potential investors and supporters.
"We are thrilled to graduate our first cohort of social entrepreneurs. This group of people are helping solve some of Africa's biggest health challenges through their initiatives aimed at improving mother and child care. This is another great example of the strong entrepreneurial spirit in Africa", said Jay Ireland, President & CEO, GE Africa.
"Addressing the global health challenges of women and children living in sub-standard conditions or facing high-risk pregnancies demands all the determination, diligence and creative solutions we can muster," said Thane Kreiner, Ph.D., executive director of Miller Center for Social Entrepreneurship. "Now the first cohort of social entrepreneurs is emerging, ready to begin making a tangible difference in maternal and child health by leveraging GE's healthcare expertise and the business-building skills imparted by Miller Center's Silicon Valley mentors."
Below are the 14 social enterprises that have completed the healthymagination Mother and Child Programme:
- Access Afya (Kenya; led by Dr. Daphne Ngunjiri) – a social enterprise creating a model for integrated community health through a chain of micro-clinics in Nairobi's slums and a Healthy Schools program that delivers check-ups, treatments and training to children in their schools;
- ayzh (Kenya; led by Habib Anwar and Zubaida Bai) – a for-profit social venture providing health and livelihood solutions to impoverished women worldwide through developing low-cost, appropriate technology designed to meet the unique needs of women in resource-poor settings;
- Health Builders (Rwanda; led by Tyler Nelson) – an enterprise that focuses on the core issues that most fundamentally challenge healthcare delivery and enhancing primary care services for over 2 million people across Rwanda;
- Health-E-Net (Kenya; led by Pratap Kumar) – an enterprise that makes high-quality medical consultations accessible to everyone by linking medical skills all over the world to places where they are in desperately short supply and empowers patients and healthcare providers in developing countries to make better healthcare decisions and seek timely and appropriate care;
- Hewa Tele (Kenya; led by Steve Alred Adudans) – a pioneer social enterprise focused on saving lives through the provision of comprehensive, affordable and accessible quality medical oxygen solutions to rural underserved healthcare service organizations throughout East Africa;
- LifeNet International (Uganda, Burundi and DRC; led by Stefanie Weiland) – an enterprise partnering with community health centers to build their medical and administrative capacity and connect them with pharmaceuticals and equipment, and ultimately transform primary care for Africa's poor;
- Lwala Community Alliance (Kenya; led by Julius Mbeya and Ash Lauren Rogers) – a community-led innovator including public health outreach, economic development and education programming with a focus on girls' and women's empowerment;
- Nurture Africa (Uganda; led by Brian Iredale) – an enterprise providing access to quality healthcare, education and sustainable livelihoods projects whilst mainstreaming child welfare and gender equality through all our activities;
- Outreach Medical Services (Nigeria; led by Dr. Segun Ebitanmi) – an enterprise addressing the childhood death problem in Nigeria by setting up a chain of women and children hospitals in peri-urban slums of Lagos equipped with stakeholder engagement systems;
- Peach Health (Ghana; led by Cobby Amoah) – a mobile electronic medical records system for easily storing healthcare records and detecting high-risk pregnancies within a few minutes aimed at making community health workers more effective at their job, saving the lives of mothers and reducing the cost maternal mortality on families, communities and the country at large;
- PurpleSource Healthcare (Nigeria; led by Olufemi Sunmonu) – a healthcare management and investment company with a vision to create integrated private health systems in Nigeria spanning preventive, curative, diagnostic, rehabilitation and wellness healthcare enterprises to address the current quality and outcomes shortcomings in the Nigerian healthcare market;
- Telemed Medical Services (Ethiopia; led by Yohans Emiru ) – helloDoctor®, Telemed's flagship product, allows people to call at any time from anywhere in Ethiopia and get instant professional medical advice and address the overall imbalance in health service distribution in the region;
- The Shanti Uganda Society (Uganda; led by Natalie Angell-Besseling) – an enterprise aiming to eradicate preventable maternal mortality throughout Uganda using a unique collaborative, holistic care model based on the midwifery model of care;
- Village HopeCore International (Kenya; led by Anne Gildea) – a medical diagnostics service provider focusing on affordable, mobile ultrasounds in Kenya.
About GE:
GE (NYSE: GE) is the world's Digital Industrial Company, transforming industry with software-defined machines and solutions that are connected, responsive and predictive. GE is organized around a global exchange of knowledge, the "GE Store," through which each business shares and accesses the same technology, markets, structure and intellect. Each invention further fuels innovation and application across our industrial sectors. With people, services, technology and scale, GE delivers better outcomes for customers by speaking the language of industry.
About GE's healthymagination commitment:
GE's healthymagination commitment is about better health for more people. We continuously develop and invest in innovations that deliver high-quality, more affordable healthcare to more people around the world.
About Miller Center for Social Entrepreneurship:
Founded in 1997, Miller Center for Social Entrepreneurship is one of three Centers of Distinction at Santa Clara University in California. Miller Center accelerates global, innovation-based entrepreneurship in service to humanity. Its strategic focus is on poverty eradication through its three areas of work: The Global Social Benefit Institute (GSBI), Impact Capital, and Education and Action Research. To learn more about Miller Center or any of its social entrepreneurship programs.
About Santa Clara University:
Santa Clara University a comprehensive Jesuit, Catholic university located 40 miles south of San Francisco in California's Silicon Valley, offers its more than 9,000 students rigorous undergraduate curricula in arts and sciences, business and engineering; master's degrees in business, education, counseling psychology, pastoral ministry and theology; and law degrees and engineering Ph.D.'s. Distinguished nationally by one of the highest graduation rates among all U.S. master's universities, California's oldest operating higher-education institution demonstrates faith-inspired values of ethics and social justice. For more information.