Intron Health, a Nigerian healthtech startup, has raised $1.6 million in pre-seed funding to advance its innovative speech recognition technology tailored for African accents. The funding round was led by Microtraction, with participation from several prominent investors including Plug and Play Ventures and Octopus Ventures.
Founded in 2020 by Dr. Tobi Olatunji, Intron Health aims to streamline healthcare processes by converting speech to text, significantly reducing the time doctors spend on paperwork. The company’s AI-powered tool is designed to understand diverse African accents, addressing a critical gap in existing speech recognition technologies.
With Africa’s largest clinical speech database, comprising 3.5 million audio clips from over 18,000 contributors across 29 countries, Intron Health’s algorithm boasts a 92% accuracy rate on medical terminology, even with heavy accents.
The startup’s impact is already evident in over 30 hospitals across Nigeria, Ghana, Kenya, South Africa, and Uganda. In one notable case, Intron Health reduced radiology result waiting times at a major West African hospital from 48 hours to just 20 minutes.
Dr. Olatunji emphasized the company’s commitment to improving healthcare efficiency and outcomes. “We’re not just digitizing records; we’re transforming how healthcare is delivered across Africa,” he stated.
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The fresh funding will be used to enhance the platform’s capabilities, including noise cancellation, multi-speaker transcription, and text-to-speech functionality. Intron Health also plans to expand its research efforts and strengthen its cloud-native and on-premises capabilities.
As Intron Health continues to grow, it’s poised to play a significant role in modernizing African healthcare systems, potentially benefiting millions of patients across the continent.
