Intron Health, a Nigerian AI company specializing in speech-to-text transcription tools for healthcare workers, has secured $1.6 million in a pre-seed funding round. The startup plans to utilize this capital to expand its workforce, enhance its research capabilities, and bolster its cloud-native and on-premises solutions.
Founded in 2020 by Dr. Tobi Olatunji, Intron Health offers a vital service to healthcare professionals by converting speech into text, significantly reducing the time doctors spend on paperwork. This innovation is crucial in many African countries, where physicians often see hundreds of patients daily. The technology allows doctors to enter medical records, issue prescriptions, and generate patient reports using voice commands.
One notable success story is the University College Hospital, Ibadan, where Intron Health has slashed radiology report turnaround times from 48 hours to just 20 minutes. “We are improving efficiency and health outcomes and positively impacting hospital finances,” Olatunji shared with TechCabal.
Despite challenges in AI applications due to inadequate data on the continent, Intron Health’s speech-to-text tool is tailored to accommodate a wide range of African accents. Olatunji, with over a decade of deep learning expertise, highlighted that their datasets include over 3.5 million audio clips covering 288 accents across African languages. “We made algorithms that train how the model responds to dominant and minority accents,” he explained.
Looking ahead, Intron Health is developing a multilingual speech-to-text product aimed at aiding doctors in communicating with patients who do not understand English. “We’ll be deploying the English to Hausa model first in the coming months,” Olatunji announced.
Intron Health faces competition from companies like Helium Health in Nigeria and Terragon Health in Kenya, which provide Electronic Medical Records and Hospital Management Information Systems. However, Olatunji emphasized collaboration over competition. “We are not trying to differentiate ourselves; we are only trying to partner with our competition,” he stated.
The company currently supports over 56,000 patients through its partnerships with more than 30 public and private hospitals across Nigeria and Kenya, including notable institutions like University College Hospital, Ibadan, Aminu Kano Teaching Hospital, Babcock Teaching Hospital, and Meridian Health Group in Nairobi.
The funding round was led by Microtraction, with additional investments from Plug and Play Ventures, Jaza Rift Ventures, Octopus Ventures, Africa Health Ventures, OpenseedVC, Pi Campus, Alumni Angel, and Baker Bridge Capital.