Drop By Drop
Swajal Water has a sustainable business model for its water ATMs which can be scaled up rapidly.
The safdarjung hospital in Delhi got a new potable water ATM in September. Within 10 minutes of its installation, there was a 200 meter long queue of people. "Such instances tell us how acute the problem of accessible clean drinking water is. It hits the ones at the bottom of the pyramid the hardest," says Vibha Tripathi, founder CEO of smart water purification solution company Swajal Water Pvt. Ltd.
A series
The purification technology was already available and so the team focused on data collection and automation to prevent service disruptions in remote locations and reduce operational costs. It raised Rs 2 crore from Agra Chains Pvt. Ltd in 2015 and the same amount from Intellecap in 2017. Most of the investment went into R&D to develop a platform based on Internet of Things, so that the systems, water quantity and water dispensing metrics could be remotely monitored. Swajal now also offers ozonisation of utensils. Tripathi says they get a warm welcome from villagers. "We got royal treatment when we visited the sites," she says.
