UC Berkeley · DEVENG 204 · Social Entrepreneurship · Spring 2026

Clinical Trial Navigator
for Africa

Knowledge-graph patient–trial matching for the continent
that carries 25% of the world's disease burden.

Sharon Wachira
Problem
Massa Coulibaly
Solution
Evans Nartey
Market
Kamilah Idris
Ask
Act I · The Problem 📍 Accra, Ghana  ·  2024
Her name is Amara.

She is seven years old. She has sickle cell disease, the most common genetic disorder in sub-Saharan Africa. Somewhere on this continent, there is a clinical trial that could change her life. Her doctor has never heard of it.

Amara · 7 yrs · sickle cell disease Dr. Mensah · searching for a trial The trial exists. She will never find it.
250+
Active trials
across Africa
< 5%
Eligible patients
ever enrolled
5 / 5
Physicians interviewed:
no digital tools used
Africa Carries the Burden

94% of malaria. 50% of sickle cell births. 1% of global trial access.

Africa map
Malaria belt
Sickle cell
845 trials
0M
malaria cases per year
94% of the global burden
0K
children born with sickle cell disease each year in Africa
50 to 90% die before age 5
0
trials conducted in Africa in 2023
out of 76,000 worldwide
What We Stand For

The foundation of Clinical Trial Navigator for Africa

Mission
Make clinical trial access equitable and actionable in Africa through intelligent, knowledge-driven patient trial matching.
Vision
An African clinical research ecosystem where inclusion is the default, discovery is automated, and trials reflect the populations most affected by disease.
Intent
Replace fragmented, manual trial discovery with scalable, machine-interpretable infrastructure that improves inclusion and clinical relevance across Africa.
Clinical Trial Navigator for Africa

A knowledge-graph platform that semantically matches patients to trials.

PATIENT Sickle Cell Hgb < 8 g/dL NCT 04712916 NCT 05183932 NCT 05290571 87% MATCH
0+
Active trials
across Africa
0
RDF triples in
the knowledge graph
0
Cities with active
trial sites mapped
From Patient to Match in Seconds

A four-step pipeline powered by semantic knowledge graph reasoning.

01 Patient Profile Demographics · Dx · Labs 02 KG Query 2,784 RDF triples 03 Ranked Matches Eligibility scored 04 Referral One-click enrollment
One Platform. Three Stakeholders.

Clinical Trial Navigator serves every stakeholder in the trial ecosystem.

Physicians
Find the right trial for every patient
  • Single-patient eligibility check
  • Per-criterion pass/fail breakdown
  • One-click referral packet
  • Enrollment status tracking
Coordinators
Manage cohorts at scale
  • Bulk CSV upload & batch scoring
  • SHACL graph validation
  • Trial portfolio dashboard
  • Enrollment kanban board
Sponsors / CROs
Reach Africa's patient pool
  • 250+ active trials indexed
  • 29 cities · 2,784 RDF triples
  • Real-time patient pool analytics
  • API access for EMR integration
A $5B Opportunity

Africa's clinical trial market is underserved, underfunded, and growing fast.

TAM $5B Africa clinical trials market SAM $800M Digitally-ready sponsors & CROs SOM $120M Year 3 obtainable target
Total Addressable
$5B
Africa clinical trials — pharma sponsors, CROs, hospital networks
Serviceable Market
$800M
Digitally-ready sponsors and CROs actively recruiting in sub-Saharan Africa
Year-3 Target
$120M
SaaS + per-match API fees across 20 hospital networks
Who Pays. How Much. Why Now.

Three complementary revenue streams, all pulling in Year 1.

Hospitals & Universities
Institutional Licensing
$8K – $24K /year
Pharma Sponsors & CROs
Sponsor Match Fees
$15K – $60K /trial
WHO-AFRO · EDCTP · Gates
Public Health Grants
$50K – $200K /grant
Revenue
Year 1
Year 2
Year 3
Licensing
$0K
$0K
$0K
Sponsor Fees
$0K
$0K
$0K
Grants
$0K
$0K
$0K
Total
$0K
$0K
$0K
Why No One Else Has Solved This

The landscape is fragmented. Africa is an afterthought. CTN is the only Africa-native matching engine.

CTN ★
ClinicalTrials.gov
Antidote / TrialSpark
IQVIA / Tempus
Africa-first design
✓
✗
✗
✗
Knowledge graph matching
✓
✗
~
~
Automated patient matching
✓
✗
✓
✓
Open / accessible pricing
✓
✓
✗
✗
EMR / FHIR integration
✓
✗
~
✓
~ = partial or US/EU only  ·  ★ = only Africa-native KG matching platform
We Have Already Started

Six months of building. Here is what we shipped.

Knowledge Graph
2,784 RDF triples · OWL ontology · SHACL validation
Trial Database
250 trials scraped · 29 African cities · eligibility parsed
Customer Discovery
5 physician interviews · 3 CRO conversations · 0 digital tools in use
Live Platform
Matching engine · bulk upload · sponsor portal · enrollment kanban
UC Berkeley DEVENG 204
Design-thinking validation · advisor network · pitch competition
Every Match Is a Child Like Amara

Our north star metric: patients matched to trials they would never have found alone.

Year 1
0
patients matched
5 hospital networks · 3 countries
Year 3
0
patients matched
20 hospital networks · 8 countries
Year 5
0
patients matched
Continental scale · all 54 countries
~11× LTV / CAC
~80% Gross Margin
<6 mo Payback Period
Late Y2 Break-even
Help Us Find Every Amara

We are raising $120,000 seed to reach 5 countries and 500 matched patients in Year 1.

Use of Funds — $120K
Engineering & Infrastructure$60K
Salaries & Team$80K
Hospital Partnerships$20K
Operations & Legal$15K
18-Month Milestones
Sign first paying hospital (LUTH, Nigeria)
Expand to Kenya, Ghana, South Africa
500 patients matched · 3 active sponsor contracts
WHO-AFRO / EDCTP grant secured
"Amara's doctor found her trial in 4 seconds.
She started treatment last month."
This is why we built CTN.
"Somewhere in Africa, a child named Amara is waiting.
We built CTN so her doctor can find the trial in seconds."

Thank You

Any Questions?
Sharon Wachira
Problem
Massa Coulibaly
Solution
Evans Nartey
Market
Kamilah Idris
Ask
UC Berkeley · DEVENG 204 · Social Entrepreneurship · Spring 2026
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