Folake Soetan Owodunni is a Co-Founder at Emergency Response Africa. Folake is dedicated to making healthcare accessible in Africa, she is a skilled communicator and Prosci-certified Change Management Practitioner with over 9 years of experience in healthcare, non-profit, consulting and higher education sectors in US, Nigeria and Canada. She has a passion for solving problems and gets energised by opportunities that require critical thinking, building new systems, storytelling, communicating with diverse audiences, leadership and project management.
Emergency Response Africa is a healthcare technology company that is changing how medical emergencies are managed in Africa, beginning in Nigeria.
By combining training, technology, and transportation, they are creating a scalable emergency medical services system.
They are building the largest network of First Responders, emergency response vehicles, and verified Emergency-Ready hospitals across Nigeria who are connected to emergency victims using their technology application.
This end-to-end subscription service ensures that in any medical emergency, they deliver the right level of care at the scene, and if needed, the patient is transferred to the most appropriate hospital for prompt treatment.
Earlier in the year, Folake spent four days in San Francisco as part of the Silicon Valley Olympiad, a tour sponsored by the Japan International Cooperation Agency (JICA) as part of their Next Innovation with Japan (NINJA) start-up competition for Africa, with support from Double Feather Partners and 500 Global.
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Emergency Response Africa was one of seven Nigerian and Kenyan start-ups that attended the trip and what an experience it was. “As a founder, some of the best support and advice I have received has come from other founders, especially those who were further along. This trip was no different.” Folake said.
The 5 things she learnt from the trip includes: You can engineer creativity and innovation, patience and persistence produce the greatest results, dig deep and build for long term, ask for help and be generous with yours and surround yourself with passionate people because “it is like getting a booster shot” she stated.
Folake bagged a Master of Business Entrepreneurship and Technology – MBET from the University of Waterloo, a Certificate in Digital Marketing Management from Sheridan College (An intense employment bridging program designed for internationally experienced professionals, providing up-to-date knowledge and skills in business communications and project management), an MSc in Global Health and Development from UCL and a BSc in Biology from University of Oregon.
