Uganda’s e-Health Startup Neopenda Wins USD 30 K In UN Women She Innovates Prize
Uganda and US-based health-tech startup, Neopenda, have won a cash reward of USD 30 K after being named the recipients of this year’s UN Women She Innovates Prize for Gender-Responsive Innovation.
Having initially caused disruptions in the health-tech space with its debut product which is a wearable neonatal vital signs monitor, the startup appears to be unrelenting in its drive to develop innovative medical technologies for high-growth emerging markets and the latest success might be a testament to that.
The latest edition of the UN Women She Innovates Prize for Gender-Responsive Innovation was the result of concerted efforts between Citi, SAP Next-Gen and MIT Solve. As was covered by WeeTracker in an earlier publication, the Solve initiative from the MIT announced 33 new Solver teams who had been selected to take part in the Solve Challenge Finals. This live pitch competition was organized as part of events set aside to herald the UN General Assembly Week in New York.
The teams that make up the latest Solver Class are believed to have been drawn out from 15 different countries. These organizations are said to have been selected from a pool of 1,150 applications from 110 countries. Sixty-one percent of the 33-team-strong Solver Class are believed to have females at the helm of affairs. The proportion of for-profit organizations in this new class is placed at 64 percent while 24 percent is the figure for nonprofit organizations. Hybrid organizations are believed to account for 12 percent of the teams in the latest Solver Class.
“We are incredibly inspired by each new Solver selected at the Solve Challenge Finals as they advance solutions to four of the world’s biggest challenges,” Alex Amouyel, Executive Director of the Solve Initiative, is quoted as saying with regards to the development.
Such categories as ‘Work of the Future’, ‘Frontlines of Health’, ‘Coastal Communities’, and ‘Teachers and Educators’, form the foci of the annual Solve Challenge. The initiative is aimed at identifying and unearthing some of the most promising organizations who are known to be making significant strides in those four areas with a view to provoking transformational change. The selected organizations are then supported through partnerships with a global community of private, public, and nonprofit leaders to scale their impact.
For their efforts, Neopenda has been awarded this year’s UN Women She Innovates Prize for Gender-Responsive Innovation, which can be considered an offshoot of MIT Solve’s Frontlines of Health category. The cash reward received can be expected to go some way towards helping the startup further develop its technology and offerings.
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