The WHO Foundation And OurCrowd Launch $200 Million Global Health Equity Fund

Enterprise & Cloud The WHO Foundation And OurCrowd Launch $200 Million Global Health Equity Fund Gil Press Senior Contributor Opinions expressed by Forbes Contributors are their own. I write about technology, entrepreneurs and innovation. Following New! Follow this author to stay notified about their latest stories.

Got it! Sep 19, 2022, 11:30am EDT | Share to Facebook Share to Twitter Share to Linkedin The Covid-19 pandemic has exposed chronic weaknesses in health systems, the under-funding of healthcare provision, and inequitable access to technology solutions. The vaccines, medicines, and diagnostics developed to fight Covid-19 have remained unavailable to the majority of the populations of low-income countries. Coronavirus Vaccine Global Production, Availability and Distribution getty Aiming to deliver competitive returns to investors in the healthcare sector while ensuring equitable access to medical care, OurCrowd , a leading global venture firm announced today the launch of a Global Health Equity Fund (GHEF) in collaboration with the WHO Foundation .

The Global Health Equity Fund is a $200 million unique financial-first impact venture capital investment fund, focusing on breakthrough technology solutions that can impact healthcare globally. “I am proud of our track record of identifying healthcare investments that have delivered value to patients and investors. This new fund builds on that success with the explicit orientation of having impact.

The collaboration with the WHO Foundation will allow us to identify even more exciting investments and facilitate the commitment of investors and entrepreneurs to equitable access to the technologies we support,“ said in a statement Jon Medved, OurCrowd founder and CEO. The Global Health Equity Fund will focus on healthcare and the industries that are direct determinants of health, including energy transition and food agriculture, which together address markets worth trillions of dollars globally. The target portfolio companies will therefore not only innovate to improve medical care but will also work to mitigate current global health risks related to climate, fossil fuels, and looming food shortages.

Associated with the fund is an Access Pledge, an innovation of the WHO Foundation to align investment with commitments by portfolio companies to ensure that their technology solutions are available, accessible, appropriate, and affordable for populations experiencing inequity, particularly in low-and middle-income settings. MORE FOR YOU AI Startup Navina Leverages Amazon Web Services To Improve Patient Care As part of the Pledge, companies will seek to develop a commercially viable Access Plan relevant to their businesses. The WHO Foundation and OurCrowd will establish a global health advisory board to provide assistance to these companies so they can plan early for business models that combine economic return with equitable access.

“In every country in the world, too many men, women, and children lack access to adequate healthcare because of income disparities and systemic barriers that perpetuate inequity,“ said Anil Soni, WHO Foundation’s CEO. “Despite clear models for successfully balancing economic return with equitable access, such as the provision of medicines for HIV and AIDS, the world failed to deliver solutions for Covid-19 to everyone, everywhere. It is imperative that we deploy solutions in response to that failure, including directing investment to innovation and aligning both to equity as a goal from the start.

” The announcement was made at the first major Clinton Global Initiative meeting convened since 2016, held in New York City alongside the meeting of the United Nations General Assembly. “As we face multiple existential challenges at the national and at the global level, we know that innovators and emerging leaders are getting things done,” said Greg Milne, CEO of the Clinton Global Initiative. “The Global Health Equity Fund will help unlock new opportunities to expand the reach of these innovative approaches around global health, by harnessing the power of investors around the world to support solutions being driven at the community level.

” OurCrowd is the online global venture investing platform that empowers individual accredited investors and institutions to invest and engage in emerging technology companies at an early stage. OurCrowd vets and selects companies across all sectors and stages, invests its own capital, and serves its global platform of over 215,000 registered members from 195 countries. Since it was founded in 2013, OurCrowd has received over $1.

9 billion in commitments, and deployed capital into more than 347 portfolio companies and 39 funds across five continents. Past and current notable OurCrowd investments in health, AgTech, FoodTecch, and energy transition sectors include: ● Alpha Tau Medical – Treating solid malignant tumors, using targeted alpha particle-based radiation, minimizing damage to healthy surrounding tissue. ● BrainQ – Non-invasive technology that treats stroke and other neurological pathologies by using AI to detect neural patterns in patients and then tailor electromagnetic fields to target patients’ impaired neural networks, repair neural connectivity, and enhance natural rehabilitation.

● H2Pro – A novel and cost-effective system for the production of green hydrogen that allows on-premises production, enabling the wide-scale adoption of sustainable hydrogen fuel. ● Beyond Meat – Develops and manufactures a plant-based meat substitute, which can be instrumental in reducing greenhouse gases. The Global Health Equity Fund will be led by Jon Medved and OurCrowd Managing Partner, Dr.

Morris Laster, with the support of the WHO Foundation’s Chief Impact Investment Officer, Geetha Tharmaratnam. It will be managed by an OurCrowd team of clinical experts with decades of experience in medical technologies and startup growth. Follow me on Twitter or LinkedIn .

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