Nearly eight months after receiving $35 million in a Series-D funding round to expand its operations, mPharma, a healthcare startup led by Ghanaian entrepreneur Gregory Rockson, has announced the purchase of a majority stake in HealthPlus Pharmacy, Nigeria’s first integrative pharmacy chain.
The announcement follows an agreement between mPharma and the previous investor, Alta Semper, that allowed the Ghana-based healthcare startup to purchase a majority stake in HealthPlus Group.
According to Rockson, CEO and co-founder of mPharma, the acquisition aligns with the company’s mission to build a healthy Africa by providing life-changing healthcare services and drugs to patients.
“mPharma is deepening its long-standing commitment to Africa by reimagining primary healthcare in some of the most vulnerable communities on the continent,” he said. “We continue to transform community pharmacies into primary care centers to provide affordable and accessible healthcare to all patients, so they can live not just longer but healthier lives.”
Afsane Jetha, co-founder and CEO of Alta Semper Capital, stated in her remarks on the acquisition that the HealthPlus team is convinced that mPharma’s strategy of revolutionizing primary healthcare across Africa is the ideal steward for HealthPlus’s next chapter of growth.
She added that the management is excited to support the business going forward through a relationship with mPharma.
Founded in 2013 by Rockson, Daniel Shoukimas, and James Finucane, mPharma manages pharmaceutical inventories for African mom-and-pop pharmacies. It also offers unique financial and inventory management solutions to hospitals, as well as patients directly.
Since its inception more than nine years ago, mPharma has gone on to disrupt the African healthcare market, servicing about 1 million patients annually through 300 partner pharmacies in Ghana, Nigeria, Kenya, Zambia, Malawi, Rwanda, Ethiopia, and Gabon.
The acquisition of HealthPlus Pharmacy will provide mPharma with expansion opportunities in Nigeria, as well as a platform to expand its multi-pharmacy retail footprint across the continent through its rapidly growing QualityRx program.
