The government of the Republic of Côte d’Ivoire has approved an eight-year public-private partnership with Zipline to expand the country’s drone logistics network from one distribution centre in Daloa to ten across the country.
Led by Côte d’Ivoire’s Ministry of Health under the leadership of Minister Pierre N’Gou Dimba, and supported in part by the U.S. Department of State’s USD 150 million pay-for-performance award, the partnership will create one of Africa’s largest national deployments of AI and robotics for healthcare. Once fully deployed, the network is projected to serve 2,200+ health facilities and more than 12 million people.
The U.S. government will provide upfront infrastructure funding to Zipline to enable the scale-up, and the government of Côte d’Ivoire has committed to paying for ongoing operations.
This expansion aligns with Côte d’Ivoire’s “Vision 2030” agenda to scale its Universal Health Coverage (Couverture Maladie Universelle) by bringing blood products, vaccines, essential medicines and emergency supplies to communities. Zipline said it will strengthen access in rural, remote and hard-to-reach areas, including during the rainy season when roads can become difficult to use.
“Since launching in Daloa in 2023, in partnership with the Government of Côte d’Ivoire, Zipline has delivered more than 3.55 million medical products to more than 220 health facilities across five regions,” the company said in a 22 September press release.
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