Partnering UN to fight diseases in resource-poor countries

Singapore

SINGAPORE online marketplace builder Arcadier has been chosen as a partner for the United Nations Office for Project Services' (UNOPS) Defeat-NCD Partnership.

Established in January 2018, the partnership helps private and public organisations collaborate with people to tackle major global health problems such as cardiovascular diseases, cancers and diabetes. Most recently, mental health issues have also been included.

Arcadier will help to create the online Defeat-NCD Marketplace, which supports cost-effective and efficient provision of essential NCD supplies, such as diagnostic kits and essential medications, to low-resource countries. According to the World Health Organization (WHO), NCDs (non-communicable diseases) kill 41 million people each year, equivalent to 71 per cent of all deaths globally. These diseases tend to be chronic, and are the result of a combination of genetic, physiological, environmental and behavioural factors.

NCDs disproportionately affect people in low and middle-income countries where more than three quarters of global NCD deaths occur.

Dinuke Ranasinghe, chief executive officer of Arcadier, is a board member of the Defeat-NCD partnership. When the UN requested the creation of an online marketplace in September, he saw an opportunity to participate. As a board member, Mr Ranasinghe did not directly participate due to conflict of interest. Arcadier managed to succeed via UN's open-solicitation process.

The company will invest up to US$25 million over the next five years towards the creation and rollout of Defeat-NCD Marketplace. Mr Ranasinghe said: "We are working with large investment partners in Europe on the financing of the project, which will have a multi-year and multi-stage investment and capital raising plan."

The commercial project will ensure its marketplace model is sustainable, with the technology, scaled deployment and support operations managed through a revenue generating model. It will aim to provide access to medicines, diagnostics and equipment to 100 resource-poor countries over the next three to five years.

Enterprise Singapore is also supporting the marketplace, helping to connect Arcadier with private sector partners in pharmaceutical, financing and supply chain industries.

The marketplace will launch by the end of Q1 2019, with an initial rollout to six countries in Southeast Asia, Africa, and Central Europe. It will first address the needs to combat NCDs such as cardiovascular disease, chronic lung disease and cancer, while working with suppliers around the world to establish capacity and improve supply chain efficiencies.

The service will be made available to pre-approved buyers, including government agencies and non-governmental groups. Countries will be able to pool their buying power and demand together, resulting in lower prices from greater efficiencies in planning, manufacturing and supply chain.

Mr Ranasinghe said: "We've seen, through our work in public marketplaces, that the economics of online marketplaces, with the availability of choice, will result in better pricing and result in improvements in service and product quality overall. Of equal importance are the benefits to suppliers, who will now have access to new markets and have transparency in fair market transactions."

The Defeat-NCD Marketplace could play an important role for countries to meet NCD targets contained within the UN's Sustainable Development Goals (SDG 3.4), which have an agenda running to 2030. According to Mr Ranasinghe, the Arcadier and UNOPS partnership for the marketplace may run for the entire SDG duration and beyond.