Swiss-based start-up Axmed is on a mission to provide affordable medicines to low- and middle-income countries, where billions of people are currently unable to access necessary treatments due to their financial circumstances. With early-stage backing from the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, the company has secured a further $2 million in funding to continue their efforts. CEO Emmanuel Akpakwu, who grew up in Nigeria, has seen firsthand the struggles that people in developing countries face when trying to obtain essential medications.
Despite low- and middle-income countries accounting for the majority of the world’s population and disease burden, global pharmaceutical companies only earn 6% of their revenues from these nations. Axmed aims to change this narrative by allowing governments and organizations in developing countries to place orders for the medicines they need. By aggregating these orders into larger volumes, pharmaceutical companies can supply drugs at prices that are affordable for less wealthy nations, ensuring that access to essential medications is not dependent on economic status.
The founders of Axmed bring a wealth of experience to the table, with Akpakwu, Felix Ohnmacht, and Sofia Radley-Searle all having held senior roles in the pharmaceutical industry. The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation’s investment of $5 million has helped launch the platform, with a focus on improving access to healthcare for expectant mothers and newborns. However, the platform will also enable developing nations to purchase hundreds of different drugs for various diseases and conditions, ultimately improving healthcare access for millions of individuals.
Currently in the prototype stage, Axmed’s platform is set to launch commercially later this year, with an initial focus on serving customers in Kenya, Tanzania, Rwanda, Ethiopia, and Nigeria. The recent $2 million funding round led by Founderful Ventures will support further recruitment and the development of technology infrastructure in key markets in Africa and the Caribbean. Founderful Ventures sees the potential for Axmed to reshape the $140 billion low- and middle-income country pharmaceutical market, benefiting over 6 billion individuals.
Support for Axmed’s initiative comes from various stakeholders, including Roselyne Opel of the Organisation of Eastern Caribbean States Pooled Procurement Initiative, and James Nyamongo, CEO of the Nairobi Hospital in Kenya. Both see the potential for Axmed’s platform to not only make life-saving medicines more accessible but also to foster competition and raise the quality standard of healthcare products. By empowering buyers and strengthening the supply chain of essential therapies, Axmed’s approach has the potential to fundamentally change how patients in developing countries access treatments.
As Axmed prepares for its full-scale commercial launch and continues discussions with other countries, the team remains committed to their social mission and the commercial opportunities that lie ahead. With the support of investors like Founderful Ventures and the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, Axmed is poised to make a significant impact in improving access to medicines for millions of individuals in low- and middle-income countries.