AstraZeneca and the Royal Academy of Engineering have entered into a partnership to drive the development of engineering solutions and address local challenges with a focus on healthtech and healthtech entrepreneurs, according to media reports.
As a part of this commitment, to build international partnerships and solving global challenges the Academy founded The Africa Prize for Engineering Innovation in 2014. The annual award comes with crucial commercialization support to ambitious innovators across sub-Saharan Africa.
Aleksandr Bedenkov, VP, Medical International at AstraZeneca told the media, “We want to offer entrepreneurs in emerging markets like Africa the same kind of platform and opportunities that their counterparts in other countries would benefit from.”
As a part of this deal, AstraZeneca and the Academy will continue to explore together opportunities to support the healthAstraZenecacare system in the region and beyond. Healthtech startups in Africa have in the recent past received a lot of recognition bringing with it hefty investments.
Last month 54gene, a genomic startup in Africa, managed to secure over $25 million in funding to help the company expand its capabilities in precision medicine. Apart from 4gene, startups like DataPathology in Morocco, Sotech in Egypt, Aviro in South Africa have secured investments worth more than $1.5 billion last month.
Astrazenca will also join Prize’s network of expert mentors and will offer training support for Africa Prize entrepreneurs. It will also provide customised training support for Africa Prize entrepreneurs. The company will also participate in a webinar series for the Africa Prize alumni network where they will share knowledge and insights on health tech and other subjects.