About our project

The problem we solve: Each year over $20Bn is spent on healthcare in Nigeria alone (Africa's most populated nation) yet with abysmal outcomes. Medical diagnostic industry in Nigeria is valued at over $1.6Bn (PwC), yet less that 2% of industry is formalized. Over 30% of Nigerians (Africans) over 25 are clinically hypertensive and over 25% of Nigerians over 40 may be at risk of cancer Breast, cervical, colon and prostate). Medical diagnostics are too expensive so mortality rates for both diseases are high, since patients often present too late. Non-Communicable diseases are a fast growing epidemic across Africa.

About our solution: Our differentiator is BUSINESS MODEL INNOVATION. We COPY, PASTE and REPLICATE successful models in Europe and India that deploy digital and healthcare IT solutions and operational excellence (lean six sigma) best practices to manage a network of advanced diagnostic centers under a single company. This reduces operating costs and provides quality medical diagnostic care at an affordable price to a greater percentage of the population.

1. Entrepreneur (a US military veteran and citizen) over 18 yrs healthcare experience, resigned as GM of GE Healthcare Nigeria/West Africa in Sept 2016 to launch Yako
2. Raising $510K seed equity round
3. Secured $210K from US-based (Former GE Capital execs) and Nigeria (former PE execs) investors
4. Signed MOU to acquire 4 diagnostic centers
5. Secured agreements with leading US healthcare IT companies, Indian remote CVD monitoring company
6. Senior leadership ready to join
7. Need seed funds to launch 2 pilots - cancer and cardiology diease early screening and detection across Lagos.

About Our Company

How We Help Patients

Patients are our PRIMARY focus and as such, our goal is to make sure they get the absolute best patient experience for the most affordable price possible. Our diagnostic centers will be upgraded to be easthetically pleasing and welcoming, we will work with the medical equipment suppliers to be make sure we can acquire best in class technology for an attractive rate and thus pass on the savings to our patients.

We will institute a customer service program similar to the programs run by the best hospitality companies so the entire patient experience will be seamless and comforting.

Getting medical diagnostic care can be daunting because of the fear of potentially bad news, so our focus is to provide QUALITY CARE at an AFFORDABLE price delivered in the most patient-friendly environment possible.

How We Help Physicians

Curretnly physicians across Nigeria and Africa suffer from 3 major problems:

• Lack of world-class clinical care and protocols
• Lack of a dedicated patient-referral base
• Poor business infrastructure, so inability to develop a career that can help them take care of their families.

Our Yako model addresses all 3 challenges.

1. Medical Excellence: We emphasize a world-class medical excellence program and insist all our centers get accredited within a 12-18 month period. This will invariably have a direct imapct on all the referring and participating physicians in our network
2. Patient Referral: Given the organizational structure of our company, there will be a far greater pool of patients to serve compared to the current "mom & pop" structure local primary care physicians and diagnostic operators/radiologists are operating.
3. Business Infrastructure:  This will be one of the first times radiologists and participating physicians will work for a company with a world-class governance structure, senior management, transparence in financial, operational and other key performance metrics. They will also get far better rewarded for improvements in performance (patient throughput and improved medical outcomes at a reduced cost.)

How We Help Hospitals

Aross Europe and India, the business models we seek to compare and introduce to Africa, have had a significant reduction in the total overall cost of care, but more important have helped hospitals operate at a far greater efficiency and as a resutl, greater profitbability.

We are positioned to serve as an outsourced advanced diagnostic partner for most of the major hospitals currently operating across Nigeria and West & Central Africa, as well as many others currently approved for financing by investors and under development.

How We Help Partners

Most of our partners are technology and operations companies that currently do not have a presence in Africa, particularly in Nigeria, Africa's largest market.

We offer an opportunity for those healthcare companies that have an innovative and entrepreneurial solution to partner with us and develop a market-leading solution to serve the over 1Bn population across Africa.

We offer one of the world's last and most profitable growth opportunities for those companies that have a genuine desire to transform the world and are not discouraged by the noise about Africa, yet have a global appreciation for the role the African consumer will play in the world economy within the next 10 - 20 years.

Innovation Details

Intellectual Property Summary

Our approach is steeped in process improvement using a combination of medical equipment planning, healthcare information technology, medical excellence quality programs as well as organizational design. We intend to develop and file for a UTILITY PATENT within 12- 18months follwing the validation of our business model.

This is consistent with business model innovation and we would be one of the first healthcare companies in Africa to file for such a UTILITY PATENT.

We had hoped to license the existing utility patent or Standard Operating Procedures from one of our European partners to exepdite our operations, but due to delays in the partnership, we have committed to go at it alone and develop a locally customized process and patent.

Clinical Information

We have designed two 6-month clinical pilots as focused:

1. Project Apaxis: A proejct to screen, detect, refer and treat patient at risk of cardiovascular disease using remote ECG monitoring technology and interpretation systems. We have signed experssions of interest with an Indian company and leader in remote ECG monitoring working with GE Healthcare, and have also signed an agreement to serve as imaging partner for a leading cardiology practice in Lagos. 
2. Project Raphael: A proejct to screen, detect, refer and treat patients with cancer (breast, cervical, colon and prostate). Here too we have signed a partnership to work with a local cancer clinic in Lagos that currently focused in chemotherapy and surgery and has a strategic partnership with a leading cancer institute in New York State, US.

In both cases, our local partners (cardiology and cancer clinics) need to significantly improve their medical diagnostic capabilities to be able to provide greater quality care to a larger portion of the population and at a far more afforadble price. 

At the end of both pilots, we intend to have screened 3,000 patients (1500 each) and will publish the outcomes of the trials through white papers and relevant medical journals. This outcome data will be critical in our efforts seek a utility patent and more important, further strengthen our position as a market differentiator, providing QUALITY and AFFORDABLE care to all Africans in both the private and public sector.

Regulatory Status

We are not funding a medical trial that will get submitted to the FDA, so we do not anticipate engagement with the US FDA. Also, since our market focus in Nigeria and Sub-Sahara Africa, we doubt we would need FDA approval anytime soon.

However as stated above, we are raising the seed funds ($510K) to deploy 2 pilot trials, so we would appreicate support to help us complete both trials.

How we will use the funds raised

- Secure and enter into formal agreements to acquire majorty stake in at least 2 diagnostic centers

- Acquire medical equipment and related healthcare IT technology required to succesfully launch both pilot trials for cardiology and oncology

- Complete agreements with relevant international and local technology and operating partners required for success in the pilot trials

- Hire additional members of the leadership and proejct team to execute on the pilot trials, and

- Put in place required process to position the company for scale and raise a A-round of circa $5M

Thank You

On 11 April 2004, I lost my father to prostate cancer at age 63. He was my entire uninverse and after serving the US Consulate in Cameroon, Central Africa for over 35years, he had the privilege of an early retirement and moving his family to the US before he died. In his shadow, I joined the US Navy, became a citizen and tried to do may part to serve the country that gave our family so much.

When daddy died, I committed to build at least one hospital in Africa in his honor to save the lives of at least one more daddy because my father's loss was so painful and still hurts to this day.

After a successful career in pharma sales with Pfizer in 2005, an MBA at Rice University in Hosuton and a stint with a healthcare venture capital firm in Houston, I was hired by GE healthcare to move to Africa in 2013 and help grow the business.

I recognized the fire was still burning in me to make a difference and keep my promise to my late father and to Africa.

We also understand most Americans are either unaware of at best skeptical of investment opportunities in Nigeria or Africa!

My family and I have made signifncat sacrifices and committed all we have to achieve this dream. My wife and our 3 young sons are still living in Houston, TX and after more than 4 years, while I struggle to make this dream come true.

We have been extremely blessed to get some strong support from some former GE Capital executives based in the US and a lovely lady (Nigerian/American and HBS grad) who used to work for a leading PE firm in Nigeria.

We need more support from the global community of healthcare investors to make a difference. We seek to create a New Normal in Healthcare Delivery in Africa and we ask you to join us on this divine mission. We need to ave as many lives as possible and create an economic revolution in Africa through healthcare.

Investor Info

Market Size

Total Healthcare Expenditure in Nigeria was $18.3Bn in 2014.https://www.rvo.nl/sites/default/files/Market_Study_Health_Nigeria.pdf.

In addition, the PwC Healthcare office in Nigeria assessed the market size of the medical diagnostic sector to be $1.64Bn following a market survey study in 2016. There are said to be 10,000 registered providers of medical diagnostic service across Nigeria yet the top 4 providers together account for no more than 2% of the market offering.

Projected 3 Year Growth

Proejctions: Please note that the current top 4 providers of medical diagnostic services across Nigeria collectively account for no more than 2% of the market share currently.

2018

• Revenues: N1.1Bn ($2.75M)
• EBITDA: -6.3%
• Market Share: 0.17%
• Number of Diagnostic Centers: 8

2019

• Revenues: N5.16Bn ($12.9M)
• EBITDA: 16.83%
• Market Share: 0.75%
• Number of Diagnostic Centers: 15

2020

• Revenues: 13Bn ($32.5M)
• EBITDA: 25.8%
• Market Share: 2%
• Number of Diagnostic Centers: 18

Revenue Model

Ou revenue model is fee for service. Our centers provide specialty diagnostic services (imaging and pathology) to patients for a fee. This is the same revenue model currently being deployed by the providers of medical diagnostic care across Nigeria and Africa. The challenge historically has been as follows:

1. Over 90% of healthcare is still out of pocket or cash based
2. HMO and health insurance coverage is less than 5% across Nigeria and most other countries across West & Central Africa
3. Opportunity for revenue leakages exist of there are not enough controls in place and if we do not use IT to track patient flow
4. In addition, a system that focuses on pearly screening and identification (like we intend to deploy) should drive greater patient traffic to our centers thereby increasing revenue
5. Finally, our affiliations with specialty centers for patient referral such as cancer and cardiology clinics gives us greater ability for patient/customer loyalty since the probability of better medical outcome would appear greater with our Integrated Care Ecosystem (ICE).

Competitors

Yako is a platform to create medical-leading clinical services and technology solutions companies. Our goal is to enable access to quality and affordable healthcare to all Nigerians and Africans through an Integrated Care Ecosystem (ICE). 

Our diagnostic and specialty care business is the first model we are aware of that seeks to aggregate diagnostic and specialty care and delivered though a network approach by acquiring other existing centers and applying operational efficiencies.

Some of our potential competitors in the Nigeria marekt include: Mecure Diagnostics, Union Diagnostics, Clinix, Pathcare and ClinaLancet. 

Traction

We have signed agreements to acquire 4 advanced diagnostic centers and plan to launch 2 pilot trials by end of September or early October 2017. Our target partners are currently serving patients and geberating revenues so all 4 businesses are generating income. The growth opportunity is for our ssytem to be applied and then enhance the operations for greater revenues and reduced cost.

Due Diligence Docs

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Supporters

• 
  HyeongSuek Lee
  07/29/2019 - Liked the project.
• 
  HyeongSuek Lee
  07/29/2019 - Interested in investing in the project.
• 
  Ephraim Zagelbaum, Master’s Degree in Business Administration from Seton Hall University
  10/06/2017 - Liked the project.
• 
  Alex Fair, MS
  08/04/2017 - Interested in investing in the project.

Comments

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