CarePay a health financing technology company has been awarded the Entrepreneurs for Resilience Award plus a cash prize of Ksh. 30 Million by the Swiss Re Foundation.
The award is a recognition of company’s M-TIBA platform in helping millions of Kenyans to access and pay for healthcare. Currently, over four million people are registered on M-TIBA and it is available at more than 1,400 healthcare providers.
The award recognises entrepreneurial initiatives that take innovative approaches to building resilient societies and realising the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals. The 2019 award cycle for the Entrepreneurs for Resilience Awards focused on innovative solutions from all over the world that offer more and better access to healthcare for households in low-income communities.
M-TIBA started out as a mobile savings platform, with low transaction costs, for low-income Kenyans excluded from mainstream health insurance schemes. It now supports various sources of funding including; remittances from family members, employer payments, donor funding and health insurance. The platform has transformed the way Kenyans are paying for and accessing healthcare. It helps ensure that funds are spent on the right person, for the right care, in the right place.
CarePay was selected among three finalists by a jury of Swiss Re senior executives and academic representatives at an award ceremony in Beijing, China. The second and third runners-up were Yibao Plan from China and Fyodor Biotechnologies based in the USA, with operations in Nigeria. All three finalists will also receive coaching and technical advice from Swiss Re employees with relevant expertise over the next two years.
CarePay has indicated that they will use the prize to invest in software development, connection of more healthcare providers to it platform, and further market education to support the registration and management of universal health coverage programmes in Kenya. M-TIBA was recently selected for the mass enrolment of households in three of the four “pilot counties” for the Government of Kenya’s Universal Health Coverage programme.
Kees van Lede, Chief Executive Officer, CarePay Ltd had this to say, “This award recognises CarePay’s commitment to empower people to make informed decisions on how to finance and access healthcare. Being chosen out of 200 outstanding companies from all over the world shows that we are on the right track in our mission to give everyone the power to care. I’d like to congratulate our Kenya-based team who have built and scaled M-TIBA to where it is today.”