Naspers enters US healthcare

Naspers’s venture capital arm has taken another small bet on the US healthcare technology sector, leading a $50m investment into a firm called Honor. /

Naspers’s venture capital arm has taken another small bet on the US healthcare technology sector, leading a $50m investment into a firm called Honor.

Thanks to the sale of shares in China’s Tencent and India’s Flipkart, Naspers has a R151bn war chest and wants to show investors that it is more than just a proxy for Tencent.

Honor, which runs a network for home-care providers that cater to the elderly, said in a statement this week the proceeds of its Series C funding round would be used to “support the rapid expansion of the Honor Care Network”.

The $50m funding round was led by Naspers Ventures, with participation from existing investors, bringing Honor’s total funding to $115m, it said.

“Naspers looks for opportunities that address big societal needs in high-growth markets, and partnered with Honor because they are … addressing these macro-trends while alleviating the strain on health systems and senior care providers,” said Mike Katz, US investments head at Naspers Ventures.

By 2050, the global population of people over 60 was likely to more than double, “creating a pronounced demographic shift around the world”, Katz said. At the same time, disability rates were increasing.

A Naspers Ventures representative told Business Day that the unit had “performed a detailed exploration of the elder care market” several months ago. Honor was “one of the fastest-growing, nonmedical homecare companies in the US”, the spokesperson said.

Naspers Ventures has also backed Human Diagnosis Project, a company that runs an online consultation system. Earlier in May, Naspers sold its entire 11.2% stake in Flipkart for $2.2bn (R28bn), while it recently sold a portion of its shares in Tencent for HK$77bn (R123bn).