Access to Medicines for Everyone

Africa accounts for 25% of the total global disease burden, with 90% of the world’s malaria deaths, 75% of HIV/AIDS cases, and more than 25% of tuberculosis (TB) deaths. Despite these facts, Africa only consumes 1% of global healthcare spending.

In most African countries, the availability of essential medicines is only 40-60%. Inability to access essential medicines has dire consequences on patient health outcomes, as many of the deaths in Africa can be prevented or treated with timely and affordable access to medication. Dangerous or deficient substitutes or counterfeit medications are circulated in the absence of quality medications. 

Most African countries still lack sufficient pharmaceutical manufacturing and rely on imports from large international manufacturers for 70-90% of their medication. Purchasing power is often low due to fragmented demand and rigid expiry dates, which lead to unfillable small batch requests.

The absence of timely and affordable access to medicines constitute the complex problem we refer to as global drug insecurity.

Establishing local medication manufacturing reduces global supply-chain dependence and allows for local small-batch and personalized production of essential drugs at the point of consumption, resulting in improved health outcomes, health system strengthening, job creation, and reduced greenhouse gases from shipping.

KemNet is a software platform that enables refugee camps, various public institutions and pharmacies to easily order high quality locally custom made medications from best in class KemNet prequalified labs. KemNet also enables patients and prescribers to request quality custom made medications from pharmacies on the platform. Medications sourced from KemNet are reformulated medications that are customized to prioritize the exact needs to our end users.

KemNet enables pharmacies to keep a transparent regulatory and third-party insurance audit trail. Over time, KemNet enables medication demand monitoring and fulfillment. KemNet will harness this data in artificial intelligence to predict medication need and send notifications to coordinate which medications are made in different locations to optimize drug formulation in various labs on the platform for efficient production.

The African Union has identified home-grown pharmaceutical manufacturing as an opportunity for local development that will have positive social, economic and health impacts. KemNet advances vulnerable countries’ health security and builds their resilience to future pandemics and other supply-chain disruptions. 

KemNet's platform will enable labs, refugee camps, public institutions, pharmacies and governments to employ local capacity to make customized medications on demand to fulfil their local needs.

KemNet’s founder Morẹ́nikẹ́ Ọláòṣebìkan was born in Ikeja, Lagos, Nigeria with dreams of becoming a physician, like her father. She grew up witnessing entire communities of parents succumbing to HIV and AIDS and hearing of mothers passing the disease to their children despite taking prophylactic medications. Unfortunately, Nigeria was, and continues to be an epicentre of counterfeit drugs–she later learned that the medications these patients were taking were made of baking soda.

When Ọláòṣebìkan was 19, she contracted tuberculosis, a curable and preventable disease that almost exclusively affects individuals in developing countries. She attended a clinic every month, which also treated people living with HIV, to endure nine months of TB quadruple therapy. There she witnessed, first-hand how devastating HIV can be within inequitable healthcare systems.

It was then that Ọláòṣebìkan found her life’s purpose: to advocate for every individual’s access to safe and affordable medications. Today, she is a pharmacist working to achieve health equity.

Lack of access to medications continue to be a major problem in African countries. Africa imports up to 90% of its medications. Only 40% to 60% of the population has access to many essential medications, and some 1.6 million people needlessly die every year because they do not have access to lifesaving drugs for HIV and AIDS, tuberculosis and malaria. 

To effectively create access to life saving medications across Africa, we need to change how medications are manufactured and delivered. So, what is the solution?

A software system and platform that enables Africans to reformulate and locally make customized versions of their medications.

The network of lab, refugee camp, public institution, pharmacy, prescriber and patient users on the platform will support real-time medication demand gathering as labs make medications on demand. The platform will also collect data to help predict future demand. In addition to reducing supply chain reliance and energy intensive shipping and distribution, this system will drastically improve health outcomes, create jobs, empower local communities and support health equity.

KemNet is driven by a brilliant team of social innovators pursuing a systems-level solution to global drug insecurity. As complex problems require the practice of humility in collaboration, KemNet is working with key decision makers in 8 African countries, Canadian business collaborators, the Federal Government agencies in 3 countries and several other allies and supporters toward profitable social impact.

KemNet is led by Morẹ́nikẹ́ Ọláòṣebìkan, CEO, BSc. Pharm, RPh, EMBA:

• >31 years entrepreneurial experience, including two time pharmacy owner and pharmacist with annual revenue of $4M, 25 Staff.

• Founded Ribbon Rouge Foundation 17 years ago, it is a social innovation working to achieve health equity; raised/ generated in her proposals total program funding of $3.5M (5 years); 13 graduate fellows employed and 5 full time staff. Ribbon Rouge Foundation achieved United Nations ECOSOC special consultative status in 2022.

• Her experiences in global health have taught her that the lack of medication access and youth unemployment are significant drivers of the HIV burden in African countries. She has committed her life to contribute sustainable solutions to these issues.

Lab Manager is Onyinyechi Nnaji BScPHARM, RPh:

• > 8 years of progressive pharmacy leadership experience [Nigeria and Canada]. 
• Specializes in Business Operation, Public Health/Health Promotion, Health System/Hospital, Retail Pharmacy. 
• Served as facility focal person in the implementation of the SIDHAS HIV/AIDS program and the Roll-Back Malaria program in Nigeria.

Regulatory Affairs & Quality Assurance Lead is Helen Okoli BScPHARM, RPh:

• > 17 years clinical pharmacist experience [Nigeria and Canada]
• >13 years in formulation, process development and manufacturing of solid, semi-solid, liquid dosage forms
• > 2 years of progressive executive regulatory affairs & quality assurance leadership experience at GlaxoSmithKline. 
• Experience packaging pharmaceutical products; scale-up; commercialization; planning, monitoring and controlling manufacturing and packaging operations according to c-GM

Integrator is Mikail Adekunle BSc, MSc, MTechM, MBA:

• >11 years technical sales experience

• > 3 years product management experience

We launched kemnet.ca in beta February 2022 and since then version 1 of KemNet has grown from 15 pharmacies and 2 labs to 40 pharmacies purchasing and 8 labs. ~ 3000 bottles of acetaminophen, ibuprofen and amoxicillin have also been distributed to resolve shortages of children's medications in Canada. KemNet has grown from Alberta to include subscribers in Alberta, Saskatchewan and Ontario

In 4 pilots, we will serve

• 100 patients every month in Nigeria from January, 2024
• 575,000 refugees in Kenya in a 3 month pilot in Kenya from October 2024
• 200,000 to 250,0000 patients from 2024 - 2025 in Botswana
• 500,000 patients from 2025 to 2026 in Mauritius

We applied to the MIT SOLVE Fragile Contexts Challenge as much for the prestige and potential connections with MIT as for the prize money. As an early stage venture, though, the funds would be tremendously helpful in accelerating our pace of growth as a global problem solver.

Prize money from MIT SOLVE will help fund the hiring of a world-class Chief Technology Officer. The CTO role will be a critical one for KemNet Group, with the person we hire being responsible for executing on technically sound software development overseeing the integration of vastly different regulatory and legal regimes in an global digital medication distribution platform.

KemNet offers three main macro benefits:

1. Transformative: KemNet’s new approach allows for mass customization of medicines. In this way, Africans are able to personalize medications to access medications that prioritize their particular needs.

2. Adaptive: making medications just-in-time allows changes in production to meet demand, especially as a disaster/emergency preparedness solution. The decentralized network allows for optimization across all regions, while further lowering shipping costs through pooled procurement via the network’s collective buying power. For example, Botswana could save more than $15M/y (15% of $100M) in shipping costs and shrink procurement lead time from 12 months to 24 hours!

3. Social Impact: Health outcomes will improve from superior and timely access to readily available and affordable life-saving medications – such as Albendazole for deworming in Dadaab and Kakuma [the 2 largest UNHCR refugee camps in East Africa]. KemNet's lab pre-qualification processes and systems will empower communities to produce their own medications by providing training and skilled employment opportunities in STEM. For every 200k people served by KemNet, we will directly create 100 high-skill jobs and 180-250 indirect jobs. The local nature of KemNet supports the balance of trade in African countries.

KemNet is focused on five overarching equity impact goals:

• Gender (Women's Health): To provide timely life-sustaining medications to mothers and children.

• Public Health: To improve drug access to populations in rural, remote, and low-resource setting.

• Talent & Skills Development: To reverse the African “brain drain” and ensure that human capacity exists in African countries for sustainable development.

• Job Creation & Employment: To create high-quality STEM jobs in the countries in which we operate.

• Balance of Trade: To strengthen countries’ economies.

In practice, this will be represented across several progress markers:

Countries Served

• 2024: 5 (Canada, Kenya, Nigeria, Botswana, Mauritius)

• 2026: 11 (Canada, Kenya, Nigeria, Botswana, Mauritius, Chad, Rwanda, Cameroon, Ghana, Eswatini, Zambia)

Medications Produced

• 2024: 750 - 1000 (based on our first lab's successful revenue generating Proof of Concept work, 512 unique custom made medications have been made from 2021 - date) 

• 2026: 1500 - 1750

Doses Provided

• 2024: >1.4 million

• 2026: >555 millionJobs [Directly & Indirectly] Created

• 2022: >1750

• 2026: >5950

As a digital health platform, KemNet will flexibly scale both across countries and within countries – qualifying multiple labs, upskilling local pharmacists and engineering capacity and adapting medication production as needed based on real-time KemNet supply-chain intelligence.

Since launching our revenue generating lab in 2021 and software solution in 2022, we have been guided by progress measures aligned with several UN Sustainable Development Goals – in particular to SDGs 3, 8, and 9.

SDG 3-Good Health & Wellbeing

• Number of shorted medications made 

• Delivery times of essential medications to rural areas 

• Chronic disease medication compliance as related to shorted medications 

• Number of rural areas served

• Volume of medications made and supplied to rural Alberta

SDG 8-Decent Work & Economic Growth

• Number of STEM jobs created  – and for racialized women

• Number of international pharmacy graduates internships per annum

• Number of internationally trained engineering internships/co-ops per annum

• New Market - Drug Shortage Revenue generated per annum

SDG 9-Industry, Innovation & Infrastructure

• Number of partners/members added into networks for decentralized manufacturing and to develop infrastructure in rural areas

• IP generated and protected/ Number of patents secured (as appropriate) for complex “Made in Canada” technology

We launched our lab in 2021 and launched our software in 2022, and since then we have accomplished the following:

SDG 3

+ 40% of medications made in our lab are orders from and deliveries to pharmacies in rural Alberta

+ Medications are made and delivered within 24 hours of requests

+ an estimated 3000 bottles [estimated families] accessed commercially out of stock children's medications

SDG 4

+ 85 Students/Interns Educated

SDG 8

+ 14 Young Adults Employed

SDG 9

+ Built a lab and created best in class quality management systems through which we make customized commercially unavailable medications on demand

+ 17 unique products in development for finished product registration

+ developed kemnet.ca 

+ 10x Annual Revenue 2022 vs 2021

+ 2nd place in the Zeton/CSChE Plant Design Competition at the Canadian Chemical Engineering Conference in 2021

+ First place among 28 chemical engineering capstone projects in 2020

+ > 25 partnerships at various stages of development including [pharmaceutical companies, on the ground partners in African countries, financiers/ funders, academia, government agencies]

KemNet’s overarching long-term goal is Health Equity in African countries.

Our theory of how we change the world is that:

1.  If we connect all the players in the medication supply chain such that local capacity is developed, we are able to make medications that are customized to specific personal and regional requirements. 
2. When we make and supply customized medications on demand, we resolve medication access issues related to infrastructure and supply chains.
3. In addition, we resolve more nuanced access issues related to drug delivery into the body and medication adherence by creating personalized formulations that work more effectively for each person's unique body.
4. Creating medication access in this way, enables well-being for people who are marginalized in our current health systems globally.

Our Theory of Change is based on our successful proof of concept through our work in Canada. We continue to learn and adapt as we build.

To Equity.

KemNet, is a streamlined and accessible online storefront whereby registered refugee camps, public institutions and pharmacy users can order customized medications that are in short supply. KemNet is available via web and mobile and can be used in all internet-connected settings (including low bandwidth areas) and allows for easy communication and tracking of order status (confirmation of order, confirmation of pick up, etc.). 

Built into KemNet is our robust quality management system to upskill and enable labs across Africa to reformulate and make customized medications as needed.

Importantly, KemNet over time, will anticipate systematic demand, thereby using aggregated, real-time, in-field data to predict shortages of essential medications in specific areas. By anticipating systemic medication shortages via visibility to historical data on orders, KemNet can then accelerate production of specific drugs in a given region and shorten the duration and persistence of essential drug shortages. Over time, we expect to enhance the efficacy of this Big Data analysis through deeper AI/ML.

KemNet increases medication accessibility to our end users by investing in understanding the various challenges that equity deserving communities face when they are trying to access pharmaceutical care. KemNet is deeply invested in understanding various medication needs of the critically diverse African populations we serve to co create equitable, sustainable personalized medicine solutions.

KemNet is a globally dispersed (North America and Africa) team of multidisciplinary, multicultural, and critically diverse pharmacists, researchers, engineers, builders, entrepreneurs, and students. Diversity is our greatest strength.

It begins with KemNet’s founder, Morẹ́nikẹ́ Ọláòṣebìkan, one of the only Black Woman founders and CEOs of a global medication manufacturing company. This is noteworthy due to the global exclusion of racialized women from STEM, and the fact that STEM jobs tend to be high paying and high GDP contributing jobs. Ọláòṣebìkan already has three brilliant Black women who make customized medications with her in her lab. 

KemNet maintains a preferential hiring policy whereby candidates are reviewed for their fit-to-job criteria, and considerations are made to preferentially hire people who identify as people of African Descent, People of Colour, Black, Indigenous, immigrant, queer, women, transgender, non-binary folks, people living with HIV, neurodivergent persons, and people living with disabilities.

As a company with social impact goals focused on those who experience medication access inequitably, including mothers and children in the African context, it is important that our organization embeds EDI in its hiring and culture.

KemNet allows commercially unavailable customized medications to be made, sourced and delivered directly to refugee camps, various public institutions and pharmacies. Businesses on the platform pay a monthly recurring subscription fee.

Each country and region benefits by immediate and individualized access to essential medications. This capacity enhances national and regional health, and it improves equity internationally. 

Each country and region benefits by an upskilled workforce in engineering and pharmaceutical sciences.

Making medications locally empowers communities that produce drugs by providing training and skilled employment opportunities in STEM. For every 200,000 patient end users served, KemNet has the potential to directly create 100 high-skill jobs and between 180 and 250 indirect jobs, which is an obvious economic development win – especially for rural and remote areas.

Lastly, key decision-makers – such as Chief Pharmacists and Health Ministers – will, over time and in real-time, have better data to work from and will be better prepared in public health emergencies, potentially saving lives, time, and money. 

KemNet has achieved a successful proof of concept such that our annual revenue at year end 2022 was 10x annual revenue in 2021

KemNet’s main international clients are refugee camps, hospitals, large scale digital health platforms, and government health departments for African countries. The vast majority of prescriptions are ordered and distributed through Central Medical Stores (a single central hub), with a Chief Pharmacist that is in charge of medication procurement, and will be the main purchaser of medications produced by KemNet.

For private pharmacies and hospitals, there is no Central hub so KemNet is currently developing partnerships with reputable health service organizations who will initially broker and aggregate demand in Kenya, Nigeria, Botswana and Mauritius.

Initial projects in Kenya, Nigeria, Botswana and Mauritius are estimated to generate enough revenue to make KemNet sustainable over the next 2 years.

Our goal is to leverage grants and loans, while we continue to grow our Canadian revenue, in the near-term as much as possible to grow towards financial sustainability through more sizeable international orders.

KemNet is backed with funds from the Social Enterprise Fund, Y Combinator, the National Research Council - Industrial Research Assistant Program, Edmonton Unlimited, Black Opportunity Fund, Government of Canada, Government of Alberta and the Canadian Women's Foundation.

KemNet is being supported and facilitated in kind by Global Affairs Canada, and Alberta Innovates.