Shamiri Institute

What Shamiri Institute does

Shamiri Institute is a non-profit youth mental health organization founded in 2019 at Harvard's Lab for Youth Mental Health and operationally active in Kenya since 2021. It functions as Africa's largest youth mental health provider, delivering evidence-based psychological interventions to adolescents primarily through a tiered, task-shifted model in which trained lay providers (drawn from a pipeline of 3,000+ Fellows and 2,000+ active providers) deliver sessions under AI-assisted supervision. Stated reach is 100,000+ youth annually and 250,000+ cumulative youth served since inception, at a reported unit delivery cost of approximately $7 per youth.

The organization's technology stack consists of two layers. shamiriOS, introduced in 2022, is an internal operating-system layer coordinating provider scheduling, supervision, and program delivery across the network. shamiriAI, introduced in 2026, is the AI intelligence layer supervising session fidelity; disclosed capabilities include multilingual automatic speech recognition across English, Swahili, and Sheng; prosodic feature extraction; PII scrubbing; and LLM-based inference of provider protocol adherence. Validation across 52 sessions in Kajiado County was published in JMIR AI (2026). The evidence base supporting the intervention comprises 12+ randomized controlled trials, 18,000+ study participants, and 35+ peer-reviewed publications.

The business model is grant-funded and government-contracted, with no disclosed fee-for-service pricing. Revenue sources include foundation grants (notably the Wellcome Trust, Templeton World Charity Foundation, and Mulago) and the Elevate Prize 2026, alongside contracts with 7+ Kenyan county governments — including Nairobi, Murang'a, Kajiado, Kiambu, Kisumu, and Kakamega — and the Kenyan Ministries of Education and Health. Delivery runs through 500+ schools and community sites, with stated multi-country scaling ambitions including Ethiopia in 2026 and a published target of 1 million youth reached by 2028 and 10 million by 2031. Operational staffing is lean at 50 FTE plus the scaled lay-provider network.

Name

Shamiri Institute

Legal name

Shamiri Institute

Website

https://shamiri.institute

Company type

Private

Founded year

2019

Operating status

Operating

Headcount range

101–250 employees

Short description

Shamiri Institute is Africa's largest youth mental health provider, delivering evidence-based psychological interventions to adolescents through a network of 2,000+ trained lay providers at roughly $7 per youth, operating across Kenya and expanding into Ethiopia.

Ownership category

akta.pro rank

Product category

Youth Mental Health Services

NAICS

Child and Youth Services (62411), Other Individual and Family Services (624190), Educational Support Services (611710)

SIC

Services-Social Services (8300), Services-Misc Health & Allied Services, Nec (8090), Services-Prepackaged Software (7372)

akta.pro primary industry

Behavioral Health for Children & Adolescents (Youth Services) (HLAFACAL)

akta.pro secondary industries

School-Based Mental Health Therapy (Licensed Clinicians) (EDAKAMAD), Mental Health Screening, Assessment & Referral Coordination (School-Based) (EDAKAMAN), Youth Mental Health, Counseling & Wellbeing (Education-Linked) Nonprofits (BPAGADAK)

Keywords

• Youth mental health
• Task-shifted therapy
• Behavioral health interventions
• Mental health technology platform
• Community mental health delivery

Headquarters

HQ city

Nairobi

HQ country

Kenya

HQ region

Africa

Offices8 records

Markets served

GTM type

B2B

Offering type

Services

Cost components

Personnel, Operations, Technology or R&D, Marketing or Sales, Infrastructure

Revenue model

1. Government Contracts: Shamiri generates revenue through government contracts with county governments and national ministries (Ministry of Education, Ministry of Health) to deliver mental health programs. Governments and partners provide reach, workforce, and sustained funding.
2. Foundation and Funder Grants: Funding from philanthropic foundations and organizations committed to making youth mental healthcare accessible. Partners include Mulago Foundation, Wellcome Trust, Elevate Prize, Templeton World Charity Foundation, and other impact-focused funders.
3. Donations and Contributions: Individual and organizational contributions to support operations, with every $7 supporting one young person through a full course of care.

Pricing tiers

Go-to-market motion3 records

Distribution channels4 records

Marketing channels10 records

Core offering

Shamiri Institute delivers brief, evidence-based mental health interventions to adolescents and young adults (ages 10-24) through a three-tier stepped-care model. Trained young adult lay providers (Shamiri Fellows, ages 18-24) deliver four-session group interventions teaching strengths-based skills (growth mindset, gratitude, value affirmation, sense of purpose, problem solving) in schools and community settings, supervised by semi-professionals and licensed experts. The model is supported by shamiriOS (operating system) and shamiriAI (AI-augmented supervision) and delivered at a cost of $7 per youth.

Product overview

Shamiri Institute offers a technology platform for scalable youth mental health care centered around shamiriOS (operational infrastructure) and shamiriAI (AI intelligence layer). The shamiriOS platform integrates three products: Shamiri Digital Hub (operations backbone for multi-site coordination and workforce management), Provider Platform (clinical tools for lay providers including session templates and supervision workflows), and Rafi (client-facing app for wellbeing tracking). The shamiriAI layer provides automated fidelity monitoring via multilingual ASR and LLM-based analysis, embedded across Shamiri's tiered care model. The core care model is a three-tier system (Fellows, Supervisors, Experts) delivering brief, strengths-based group interventions at $7 per youth, validated across 12+ RCTs and 35+ publications.

Differentiator

Problem solved

Functional benefit

Brands

• shamiriOS: The operating system for care delivery that coordinates providers, clients, and sessions across sites, organisations, and contexts.
• shamiriAI
• Rafi

Products and services

• shamiriOS Technology platform for community-based mental health care delivery. Coordinates providers, clients, and sessions across Shamiri's tiered care model. Includes Shamiri Digital Hub (operational backbone for multi-site coordination, workforce management, payments), Provider Platform (clinical tools including guided session templates, supervision scheduling, and clinical documentation), and Rafi (client-facing app for wellbeing check-ins and pathways to care). Built open-source and modular for adaptation by partner organizations.
• shamiriAI AI intelligence layer that analyzes care delivery to support supervision, measure fidelity, and generate continuous feedback loops for quality improvement. Features multilingual ASR for English, Swahili, and Sheng; automated session transcription; prosodic feature extraction; and structured fidelity scoring across six domains (Required Contents, Specifics, Thoroughness, Clarity, Skill, Purity). Embedded across all tiers of the stepped-care system.
• Shamiri Intervention Model A three-tier stepped-care system where trained young adults (Shamiri Fellows, ages 18-24) deliver brief, four-session, evidence-based group interventions in community settings such as schools, supervised by semi-professionals (Shamiri Supervisors), with psychologists and psychiatrists managing complex cases (Shamiri Experts). The intervention teaches strengths-based skills including growth mindset, gratitude, value affirmation, sense of purpose, and problem solving. Cost: $7 per youth.

Quantifiable outcome

• 80% depression recovery rate — youth no longer meeting clinical threshold after 4 sessions
• +7 more outcomes

Named customers5 records

Segments3 records

Ideal customer profiles3 records

Technology focussed Yes

API detail

Has API

No

API docs

API detail

Core technology

AI maturity

App detail

AI capability6 records

Feature5 records

Partnerships

16 partnerships are on record, tiered core, major and minor.

• Harvard UniversitycoreStrategic or Co-development PartnerShamiri was founded in 2019 at the Lab for Youth Mental Health at Harvard University. Ongoing research partnership including co-authored publications and Harvard Innovations Lab affiliation.
• Ministry of Education KenyacoreStrategic or Co-development PartnerNational ministry partnership for integrating youth mental health programs into schools across Kenya.
• Ministry of Health KenyacoreStrategic or Co-development PartnerNational ministry partnership for adolescent mental health policy development and program delivery.
• Nairobi County GovernmentcoreStrategic or Co-development PartnerCounty government partnership for delivering youth mental health services through Shamiri Hubs.
• Duke UniversitycoreStrategic or Co-development PartnerAcademic research partnership contributing to Shamiri's evidence base and research publications.
• Africa Institute for Mental and Brain Health (AfriMeb)coreStrategic or Co-development PartnerJoint research partnership for multi-year adolescent mental health studies in Kenya, producing white papers and policy briefs.
• African Population and Health Research CentermajorStrategic or Co-development PartnerResearch partnership for population health research in sub-Saharan Africa.
• Aga Khan UniversitymajorStrategic or Co-development PartnerAcademic partnership for research collaboration and knowledge sharing in mental health.
• Harvard Innovations LabcoreStrategic or Co-development PartnerInnovation hub partnership supporting Shamiri's development and scaling.
• William James CollegemajorStrategic or Co-development PartnerAcademic partnership in mental health education and training.
• Kenyatta UniversitymajorStrategic or Co-development PartnerAcademic partnership for research and training collaboration in Kenya.
• Coalition for Scaling Mental HealthmajorStrategic or Co-development PartnerCoalition focused on scaling effective mental health interventions globally.
• Iroh FoundationminorStrategic or Co-development PartnerFoundation supporting youth and community development in Africa.
• CMI Global CenterminorStrategic or Co-development PartnerGlobal health partnership for mental health research and implementation.
• Muranga County GovernmentcoreStrategic or Co-development PartnerCounty government partnership running Shamiri Hubs independently using Shamiri's model and technology.
• Innovations in HealthminorStrategic or Co-development PartnerOrganization focused on health innovation and implementation.

Scale indicators16 records

Recent moves7 records

Expansion highlights5 records

Direct peers

• StrongMinds: StrongMinds treats depression among adolescents and adults in sub-Saharan Africa using a lay-provider, group-based model. It is the most directly comparable task-shifted youth mental health provider operating in Africa, with overlapping geography and beneficiary population.
• Sangath: Sangath is an India-based mental health research and implementation organization that delivers task-shifted psychological interventions in low-resource settings and publishes extensively in peer-reviewed journals. It shares Shamiri's model of combining lay-provider delivery with rigorous RCT evidence.
• BasicNeeds: BasicNeeds works on mental health and epilepsy in low- and middle-income countries through community-based and government-partnered models. It is comparable as a global LMIC mental health implementer with similar public-sector and community delivery focus.

Regional players

• Africa Mental Health Foundation (AMHF): AMHF is a Kenya-based mental health NGO delivering community programs and research. It overlaps with Shamiri's Kenyan footprint and youth-focused community model, though it does not operate the same technology platform.

Emerging players

• LifeNet International: LifeNet International partners with health facilities in East Africa to improve quality of care through training and technology. While its focus is broader primary care, it overlaps with Shamiri's East African geographic footprint and digital-enabled task-shifting model.
• Ilara Health: Ilara Health is a Kenya-based health tech company digitizing primary care providers. It is comparable as a Kenyan technology-enabled health delivery platform and shares a past leadership link (Shamiri's CTO previously led technology at Ilara Health).

Broad incumbents

• Spring Health: Spring Health is a global digital mental health platform serving employers and health plans. It is a broad incumbent in mental health technology, offering an enterprise contrast to Shamiri's government/school delivery model.
• Headspace Health: Headspace Health is a leading consumer and enterprise digital mental health platform. It is a broad incumbent with consumer-facing mental health interventions, contrasting with Shamiri's low-resource, community-led model.

Others

• Praekelt.org: Praekelt builds digital health and social services technology for low-resource African settings. It is an ecosystem peer with comparable technology-for-development DNA and similar geographic and infrastructure constraints.
• Mental Health Innovation Network (MHIN): MHIN is a global community of mental health innovators hosted by the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine. It is an ecosystem enabler that aggregates and disseminates evidence on task-shifted mental health models like Shamiri's.

Market position

Strengths5 records

Weaknesses4 records

Competitive moat6 records

Key risks6 records

Key highlights7 records

Customer concentration

• Xx.com/shamiriteam
• YouTubeyoutube.com/@weareshamiri
• Facebookfacebook.com/ShamiriTeam
• LinkedInlinkedin.com/company/shamiri
• Instagraminstagram.com/weareshamiri
• TikToktiktok.com/@shamirians

Revenue estimate

Valuation estimate

Number of profiles

Profiles11 records

Funding overview

Funding rounds2 records

Investors2 records

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M&A

Investments

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Frequently asked questions about Shamiri Institute