US to provide $150m to Zipline to boost Africa operations

The United States Government has announced a commitment of up to $150 million to Zipline International Inc. to expand access to life-saving medical supplies including blood, vaccines, and essential medicines to as many as 15,000 health facilities across Côte d’Ivoire, Ghana, Kenya, Nigeria, and Rwanda.

This was announced in a U.S Embassy digital press briefing on Tuesday, December 2.

The support forms part of the U.S. Department of State’s new America First Global Health Strategy, which aims to increase value for U.S. taxpayers by reducing waste, eliminating dependency, and ensuring development assistance aligns with U.S. foreign policy priorities.

According to Jeff Graham of the U.S. Department of State, the strategy strongly emphasizes delivering critical medical products to populations in remote and underserved areas.

He said partnering with Zipline, an American robotics and drone-technology company, is central to modernizing the U.S. approach to global health.

Under the agreement, the U.S. will support the expansion of Zipline’s American-made advanced robotics to address slow and unreliable logistics challenges that prevent timely access to essential health supplies in rural communities.

Graham described the initiative as a major step toward strengthening health systems’ ability to respond to disease outbreaks and emergencies while also supporting U.S. manufacturing and creating jobs across partner countries.

He emphasized that although the U.S. capital contribution is modest, beneficiary governments will eventually assume operational responsibility for their national health-delivery networks.

Zipline is expected to open new distribution centers across the five participating countries, with Rwanda projected to double its daily delivery capacity ultimately helping the network reach up to 130 million people in Africa.

Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of Zipline Africa, Caitlin Burton, explained that Zipline operates autonomous, all-weather drones’ day and night providing a centralized, on-demand medical-supply chain far more efficient than traditional logistics systems.

With support from organizations such as the Elton John AIDS Foundation, Zipline has built strong evidence showing that its delivery model is both cost-effective and highly impactful. The new U.S. partnership is expected to enable Zipline to expand its services to national levels across all five countries, creating an estimated 1,000 jobs and generating more than $1 billion in annual economic gains across partner nations.

Burton said Zipline’s broader mission is to strengthen health systems capable of ending preventable deaths from HIV transmission to maternal mortality and severe malnutrition using a single, high-performing national logistics network.

Speaking on taxpayer costs, she said, government investment levels will reflect national priorities and their commitment to building responsive, agile, and resilient health systems. Burton said expenditures vary depending on each country’s health needs.

Zipline collaborates closely with governments to identify, the most critical health burdens, areas where health systems fail to meet patient needs, access gaps in remote and underserved communities.

“This system is meant to operate nationwide and at the scale required to deliver volumes of medical products that can actually change health outcomes. We now know how to solve challenges like maternal mortality and malnutrition, and the network is built to meet those goals.” she noted.

She stressed that while the U.S. provides initial capital support, governments eventually cover the fixed and predictable long-term operating costs. The model allows countries to replace multiple expensive, disease-specific programmes with one unified delivery infrastructure that addresses various health challenges simultaneously.

“With this system, you’re not funding a single program or a one-off intervention. You’re ensuring that essential medical products reach patients wherever they are including communities where distance or stigma might prevent people from seeking care.” she said.