Nigerian entrepreneur Osahon Okunbo’s Vetrinox Capital has made a strategic investment in Hurone AI, a United States-based artificial intelligence company developing technology to improve cancer care and automate oncology workflows.
The investment, announced on Tuesday, will support Hurone AI’s commercial expansion across leading academic cancer centres in the United States and accelerate the deployment of its electronic health record (EHR)-integrated oncology navigation platform.
Vetrinox Capital, a Lagos-based family office founded and chaired by Okunbo, said the investment marks its first commitment to the US healthcare sector as it expands into companies developing commercially viable solutions to major social and economic challenges.
Hurone AI’s flagship platform, Hurona, is designed to integrate with Epic EHR systems and automate complex clinical workflows, patient navigation and social risk stratification.
The company said its deployment at the UCSF Brain Tumor Center analysed more than 225,000 patient interactions involving 845 patients.
According to Hurone AI, the deployment showed that 75 percent of neuro-oncology EHR messages could be automatically resolved without direct clinician intervention.
The platform also automates oncology navigation billing codes, potentially creating additional revenue opportunities for health systems while reducing administrative workloads and provider burnout.
To strengthen its approach to health equity and risk assessment, Hurone AI said it had secured strategic alignment with Mayo Clinic through licensing of its HOUSES social determinants of health framework.
The company also said it had achieved an A+ independent cybersecurity rating, alongside its native integration with Epic EHR, which it described as providing the compliance, security and technical infrastructure required for enterprise hospital adoption.
Commenting on the investment, Okunbo, Founder and Chairman of Vetrinox Capital, said the technology addressed some of the challenges cancer patients face outside conventional clinical settings.
“Cancer is fought in the hours no one sees, and in the questions no one can bring themselves to ask,” he said.
“Kingsley is building the thing that sits with people in those hours. I have wanted something like this to exist for a long time.”
The investment is being made as Hurone AI moves from early clinical validation into enterprise deployment across the US healthcare market.
Founder and Chief Executive Officer of Hurone AI, Dr Kingsley Ndoh, said the investment came at a critical stage of the company’s expansion.
He said the capital would help the company deploy its platform across leading academic research centres and expand its reach across the United States.
“As we deploy our flagship platform across top-tier academic research centres and expand our reach across the United States, aligned capital from visionaries who deeply understand our mission is paramount,” Ndoh said.
He added that Okunbo’s investment would accelerate the company’s objective of expanding access to AI-powered oncology care.
Hurone AI said its mission is centred on health equity, with a focus on ensuring that a patient’s geographical location or socioeconomic circumstances do not determine access to quality cancer care.
The company said its deployment across leading research hospitals would provide the data architecture needed to identify and address gaps in care, improve patient adherence and outcomes, and support the wider adoption of precision oncology.
Vetrinox Capital said its investment in Hurone AI reflects its broader strategy of backing businesses with commercially viable solutions to significant social and economic challenges.
The family office has investments across sectors including energy, agriculture, hospitality and the creative economy in Nigeria and other African markets.