Ten finalist teams will pitch technology-driven healthcare solutions to a judgig panel this Friday when Cimas Health Group holds the grand finale of its Healthathon 3.0 competition at its Borrowdale head office in Harare.
The event, themed “Reimagining Healthcare Through Disruptive Innovation,” caps a process that began with 372 submissions from innovators, start-ups, researchers, students and technology enthusiasts across Zimbabwe, according to Cimas Health Group Chief Information Officer Foster Akaketwa.
Speaking ahead of the finale, Akaketwa said the competition, now in its third year, had evolved from a contest into a national platform for digital health innovation, drawing entries aimed at some of the country’s most persistent healthcare challenges.
“This year’s Cimas Healthathon 3.0 has once again provided a national platform for innovators to develop technology-driven solutions to some of Zimbabwe’s most pressing healthcare challenges,” he said. “We received impressive 372 submissions, which is an increase from last year, and this demonstrates that there is both a strong appetite and considerable capability among Zimbabwean innovators to contribute to solving healthcare challenges.”
Entries tackled affordability constraints, limited access to services, fragmented data systems, delays in service delivery, low uptake of preventive healthcare, operational inefficiencies and rising costs. Akaketwa said the submissions spanned diagnostics, preventive healthcare, artificial intelligence, rural health delivery, rehabilitation, data protection and emergency response.
The field was whittled down through rounds of screening, presentations, mentorship and refinement, moving from an initial Top 20 to a Top 15 before ten teams secured places in Friday’s finale. Each of the Top 15 teams was paired with a mentor tasked with testing their assumptions, strengthening their research and sharpening their solutions for real-world healthcare use.
Judges at the finale will include Cimas Health Group leadership alongside external experts from healthcare, technology, innovation and industry backgrounds. The overall winner will receive three thousand five hundred United States dollars, with the second and third-placed teams taking home two thousand and one thousand five hundred dollars respectively.