Are you a start-up working towards the SDG’s and are based in Africa? Are you working at the cutting edge of innovation to solve real-life problems? Is your start-up innovation related to Healthcare, Life Sciences, Performance Materials, and Performance Materials and Merck’s innovation focus areas?
If you have answered yes to any of the questions above. Then we are looking for you! The Joint Start-up Programme, a collaboration between Merck Accelerator with Tech Entrepreneurship Initiative “Make-IT in Africa” is your gateway to quickly explore and validate the potential for co-creating and working in in the health sector especially in partnership with Merck.
Apply to get a chance to work on a collaboration project with existing Merck’s innovation projects.
FOCUS AREAS
- Digital Solutions in the Healthcare Sector
- Bio-Sensing and Interfaces
- Liquid Biopsy Technologies
Digital Solutions in the Healthcare Sector
Primary access to healthcare and healthcare services are key to ensure healthy lives and promote wellbeing for all at all ages. The application of technological solutions can contribute to increasing the efficiency of healthcare through enhanced access, improved affordability but also innovative diagnostic services and administration processes.
To augment the digital access solution services, we are looking for innovative and ambitious start-ups with a sustainable business model in different areas e.g.:
- Digital patient management solutions
- Savings group i.e. fintech solutions/ healthcare financing and insurance
- Rapid diagnostic tests and e-health solutions
- Digital health education solutions for patients
- Patient support programs
- Community self-service enablement solutions
Example opportunity:
Healthcare Access Solutions
CURAFA™ Points of Care, born out of the Merck innovation spirit is a pilot initiative currently consisting of 5 Primary Healthcare facilities operating at high-quality standards running in Kenya. The platform concept will provide a pharmacy with prescription and OTC medication, insurance/patient financing schemes, patient health education and clinical services enhanced through mobile and digital health solutions.
Can your solution benefit from and enhance our CURAFA points of care platform?
Bio-sensing and Interfaces
Merck’s Innovation Field “Bio-sensing and Interfaces” focuses on the interface between the biological and digital world. Around the world, healthcare costs have reached all-time highs, the pharmaceutical industry productivity is decreasing, and drugs are becoming more expensive. This situation is unsustainable in the long run. Digital technologies have enormous potential in delivering the needed change: We aim to decentralize and democratize the healthcare model and empower patients to better manage their health and we are looking for Startups that have innovative solutions covering:
- Medical sensors – wearables, patches, ingestibles, etc.
- Novel digital biomarkers
- Solutions that enable tailored medical treatment that is adaptive to patient condition.
Example opportunities:
- Real-time remote monitoring enabling decentralized healthcare
- Medical treatment tailored and adaptive to patient condition
- Measurement of and response to external stimuli and metabolic reactions
- Decrease of side effects
- Outcome- and value-based treatments, in which drugs are only reimbursed when the desired patient outcome is achieved
Liquid Biopsy Technologies
Today, the diagnoses of various diseases require invasive tissue biopsies, which not only affect patient experience and clinical utility but also disable new applications such as early detection and monitoring. With the recent advent of liquid biopsy as a new sampling and testing method, non-invasive alternatives to traditional tissue-based diagnostics are beginning to be applied more and more in clinical contexts, thereby reshaping the way of detecting and managing various diseases. Merck’s Innovation Field “Liquid Biopsy Technologies” focuses on technological solutions to overcome unresolved challenges in the liquid biopsy workflow as well as on applications beyond cancer and we are looking for you if you’re working on:
- Simpler non-invasive diagnostic tools
- New clinical sample collection, storage and processing tools
- Isolation of specific body fluid components or biomarkers.
Example opportunities:
- Non-invasive diagnosis and patient monitoring leading to early diagnosis and personalized treatments
- Individualized treatment selection in cancer and beyond
WHO SHOULD APPLY?
We are looking for start-ups that fulfil the following criteria:
- Registered in an African country and operative for at least a year
- A business model with a focus on the SDG’s and a solution in the fields of Healthcare, Life Sciences, Performance Materials and other search fields such as Biosensing and Interfaces, and Liquid Biopsy Technologies
- Start-ups with at least 2 cofounders
- The team supports gender equality and diversity
- Applicants must be fluent in English
HOW TO APPLY?
The Merck and Make-It Africa program will be targeting start-ups across Africa. We will have one application platform where participants will be required to specify which region they are applying from and where their business is registered: North Africa, Eastern Africa, West Africa, and Southern Africa.
Applications close on July 17.
