Bileeta’s Entution Vesta powers health commodity supply management in Nepal

Managing the supplies of lifesaving medicine across a country with 4000+ health facilities is a huge challenge. Ensuring the medicine supplies reach those in need whilst maintaining the stock of medicine at optimum level without wastage or expiration is critical.

Improving the health of Nepali citizens and supporting the country’s National Health Policy and Health Sector Strategy 2015–2020 has been the primary objective of USAID’s Global Health Supply Chain Program-Procurement and Supply Management (GHSC-PSM) project in Nepal. Identifying the issues Nepal is currently facing in reaching out to the rural communities, the project aims to reduce health commodity stockouts and strengthen health systems, infrastructure, human resource management, procurement, supply chain management, and health information management. 

In supporting the Nepali Government institutions to easily access and use data for decisions to improve the health of all Nepali rural community, the award-winning cloud and mobile-based ERP platform of Bileeta “Entution Vesta” recently became part of USAID’s GHSC-PSM project to streamline the health commodity supply chain management process. During a time when managing the health commodity supply such as vaccines, child health, maternal health and other medicine across Nepal was a challenge, the cloud and mobile based state-of-the-art health commodity supply chain management solution became the ideal platform to add convenience to all stakeholders involved.

The solution reduces manual paperwork involved in the inventory management, communication and approval process and becomes the central access point for a real-time logistic status. Entution Vesta is also linked with mobile apps, which ensures that everyone involved in the process, from central procurement to last mile service delivery point including mid-wives, are well equipped with information to make timely decisions to serve the community.

Commenting on the success of this project, Bileeta Ltd. Chief Executive Officer Sanji De Silva said, “It’s a privilege for Bileeta, a 100% Sri Lankan company, to be a part of a project of this magnitude with USAID, Chemonics and Ministry of Health in Nepal. We have successfully completed Phase One of this project by empowering 22 districts out of 77 districts, and are now in the process of rolling out Entution Vesta to cater to rest of the 55 districts, which is around 4000 health facilities across Nepal.  We are delivering decision-driven information with business intelligence reporting. Our success in Sri Lanka has been proven over the years with great credibility and we’re happy that we got the opportunity to carry this project in a foreign country. Our solution is flexible with greater adaptability to country-specific supply chain and logistics requirement. Therefore in future, we expect to partner with health ministries across the world in effectively supporting their unique requirements.” 

Elaborating on overcoming the infrastructure challenges of this project, Bileeta Chief Technical Officer Sankka Weerasinghe said, “The biggest challenge we had was how to implement a cloud-based solution for remote sites with poor infrastructure such as lack of stable internet connectivity or electricity. Besides the online solution, we offered a version that can work on offline mode and also as mobile apps at those sites. Therefore, our solution is fully capable of working without internet connectivity where data will be locally stored and synchronised when internet is available. The mobile app is also enabled with both online and offline versions which can be used at the health centre and health posts user level. Adding more value, Entution Vesta is also enhanced with extensive functionalities to manage health commodities such as cold-chain. What’s more, the application also optimises the flow of health commodity supply chain through forecasting, quantification, procuring and distribution.”