Josephine Christopher is a senior business journalist for The Citizen and Mwananchi newspapers
Mwananchi Communications Limitted
Dar es Salaam. Tanzanian health-tech firm Dawa Mkononi has financed more than Sh1 billion worth of medicine stock to pharmacies and clinics through a new credit platform aimed at reducing shortages and easing working-capital pressures in the country’s fragmented healthcare supply chain.
The financing programme, known as Dawa Kwanza, allows eligible health facilities to receive medicine stock immediately and repay within 28 days — a model the company says is helping smaller pharmacies maintain inventory levels amid persistent liquidity constraints.
The platform was developed in partnership with Vodacom Tanzania and NCBA Bank Tanzania as Tanzania’s healthcare sector increasingly adopts embedded finance and digital supply-chain systems. The firm’s co-founder and chief executive officer Joseph Paul said the company is seeking to combine financing and technology to make medicine access more reliable for health facilities across Tanzania.
“When you remove the barriers, everything else follows. Health facilities restock, patients get their medicines, and businesses grow. This is what we set out to build, and we are only getting started,” he said. The financing expansion comes as Dawa Mkononi scales operations after securing more than Sh8 billion from international pharmaceutical companies and impact investors targeting Africa’s fast-growing digital health market.
Its investors include Sanofi, Boehringer Ingelheim, Stanford Business School’s Impact Fund, Axian Group, Warioba Ventures, Villgro Africa, and Pontem Ventures.
Founded five years ago by Mr Paul alongside Asorael Ayo and Clemence Exaudi, the company says it has processed more than Sh50 billion in pharmaceutical sales while serving over 3,500 health facilities across Tanzania.
Its distribution network operates from Dar es Salaam, Mwanza, and Zanzibar and is supported by 130 employees. The company is positioning itself within a fast-growing segment of Africa’s healthcare economy where technology firms are attempting to solve chronic medicine shortages, weak inventory systems, and limited financing access for smaller pharmacies and clinics. Healthcare operators across Tanzania frequently struggle to maintain stable medicine supplies.
Many smaller pharmacies and Accredited Drug Dispensing Outlets (ADDOs) buy medicines in small quantities due to limited working capital, increasing procurement costs and raising the risk of stockouts.
Dawa Mkononi says its technology platform uses artificial intelligence to monitor inventory patterns and predict which facilities are likely to run out of medicines before shortages occur.
Facilities can place orders digitally, track stock levels in real time, and receive deliveries directly through the company’s logistics network.
The company says combining financing with predictive inventory management helps reduce supply disruptions while improving sales volumes for pharmacies operating on thin margins.
“The financing has helped us reduce stockouts and increase sales,” a pharmacy owner in Dar es Salaam using the programme said.
Another pharmacy operator in Mwanza said the model has reduced pressure on day-to-day cashflow management.
“We order medicines when needed and repay after sales,” the operator said.
Investor interest in African healthcare logistics has intensified as pharmaceutical demand rises across the continent, driven by urbanisation, population growth, and expanding private healthcare services.
Dawa Mkononi is now seeking to expand its financing and logistics model further as competition grows among African health-tech firms targeting pharmaceutical distribution, digital procurement, and healthcare lending.
Its broader bet is that medicine access in Tanzania will increasingly depend not only on supply availability, but also on data, logistics, and financing capacity.
