Usawa raises 3M USD to expand quality healthcare to adults and enter the US

Led by Armilar, with participation from Start Ventures, Oxy Capital and Jorge Marques, the round will support the launch of Usawa’s adult care service in October and accelerate the company’s expansion into the U.S. market before the end of the year.

Lisbon, September 23— Usawa Care, the Portuguese digital health company building high-quality clinical care for families, has raised a USD 3 million seed round. The round was led by Armilar, with participation from Start Ventures, Oxy Capital and angel investor Jorge Marques.

The new funding will be used to grow Usawa’s product, clinical and engineering teams, launch its adult care service, and accelerate its entry into the U.S. market before the end of the year.

Founded in Portugal, Usawa started by addressing one of the most frequent and stressful needs in family healthcare: fast access to trusted pediatric care. Through its pediatric platform, families can get support from pediatricians through a digital-first model, with AI helping collect information and structure clinical workflows, while doctors remain responsible for clinical decisions and recommendations to families.

Usawa already supports more than 10,000 children on its pediatric platform. Families rate the service 9.6 out of 10 on average, and more than 70% say that with Usawa they avoided unnecessary in-person consultations.

“Families need healthcare that is faster, easier to access and still deeply trusted,” said Luís Almeida Fernandes, founder and CEO of Usawa. “We believe the next generation of healthcare will combine the most trusted doctors with carefully designed technology, so that clinical teams can respond faster, with more context, and with more time for the cases that truly need them. This round gives us the resources to expand from pediatrics into adult care and enter the U.S. market.”

Usawa offers a free version of its pediatric service for families facing access challenges, as well as a paid version with longer opening hours, shorter waiting times and deep-dive consultations on recurring family health topics such as sleep, nutrition and child development.

The company is now preparing to extend the same model to adult care. The new service, planned for October, will broaden Usawa’s mission from pediatric access to family healthcare more broadly, while continuing to focus on a model that combines technology and clinician-led care.

“Usawa is building in one of the most important and complex areas of healthcare: how to make high-quality clinical support more efficient and accessible while improving trust, safety andmedical responsibility”, said Pedro Castel-Branco, Principal at Armilar.“ The team combines rare healthcare, product and technical experience. Very few founders in this space have seen healthcare from both angles: how clinical systems actually operate at scale, and what drives commercial and strategic outcomes at a global level. We are excited to support Usawa as it expands its platform and begins its international growth in the United States.“

Usawa’s founding team brings together clinical, product and technical experience. The team includes an intensive care pediatrician, a former product manager and member of the CEO team at Sword Health, and two engineers from Unbabel. Luís Almeida Fernandes, Usawa’s CEO, previously led SNS24 and Portugal’s National Center of Telemedicine, and was a Partner at McKinsey, where he led digital health work in the U.S.

The company plans to use the seed round to recruit across engineering, AI, product, design, clinical operations and growth. Usawa is particularly focused on hiring people who want to build technology in healthcare with real clinical impact, strong product standards and international ambition.

“We are entering a new phase,” added Luís Almeida Fernandes. “We have strong early traction, a mission that matters, and the backing to build a much larger company.”

About Usawa

Usawa is a digital health company building tech-supported clinical care for families. Its pediatric platform gives families faster access to the best pediatricians through a digital-first model where AI supports information collection and clinical workflows, while doctors remain responsible for care and recommendations. Usawa currently supports more than 10,000 children, with an average family rating of 9.6/10 and more than 70% of families saying the service helped them avoid an unnecessary in-person consultation. The company is based in Portugal and is expanding into adult care and the U.S. market.

About Armilar

Founded in 2000, Armilar is a Venture Capital firm based in Lisbon, Portugal, currently managing over €500 million in assets, that has built a strong reputation by investing in groundbreaking companies with a strong technological differentiation, supporting them to become ‘global winners’ in their categories. With a high-performance track record and an international footprint, Armilar focuses on early-stage technology-based companies across Portugal, Spain, Europe and USA.

Media contact:

Luis Almeida Fernandes, luis@usawacare.com, 922282164