Blogs
REVY: Administering medicines to enhance the power of STPs and ETPs
The Ganga is perhaps the best example of society’s attitude towards waste — where devotion is tainted by wilful blindness to a river’s plight. According to a report tabled in the Lok Sabha in 2017 by the Ministry of Water Resources, River Development and Ganga Rejuvenation, the very river, which...
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Bionic Yantra: Enabling paralytic patients to walk in a 100% fall-safe environment
One of the biggest endorsements for Bionic Yantra came in February 2020, when Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella said that its devices “revolutionized what happens in physical therapy for people with cerebral palsy or spinal cord injury”. There are reasons for such effusive praise. For one, the startup’s twin offerings —...
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Satyukt: Analysing satellite data to improve crop yield, conserve water
Early October, Nabventures, the venture growth equity fund of National Bank for Agriculture and Rural Development (Nabard) and Social Alpha agreed to invest USD 500,000 (around Rs 3.7 crore) as seed funding in Satyukt Analytics. The satellite data analytics startup had earned the distinction of being “one of the few...
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Saaf Biogas: Clean energy on the go
It’s a no-brainer that the reputation of Saaf Biogas is powered by clean energy. The little-over-a year-old startup, based in Bengaluru, has recently bagged a prestigious contract with a premier aerospace company to set up a biogas plant at their factory in North Karnataka. Saaf is going to transform their...
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Techtonic: In search of out-of-the-box solutions for waste management
Our cities are drowning in waste; so are our rivers, lakes and oceans. And despite the health hazards it poses, trash is ubiquitous because of our consumptive lifestyle. Our attitude towards waste also finds reflection in the way waste pickers eke out a living in wretched conditions. With existing practices...
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BleeTV: Leveraging sign language and digital technology to empower the deaf
How many people can capitalise on a failed initiative? That too in a field neglected by policymakers, entrepreneurs, and the society at large? When a smartwear for the deaf didn’t take off, the 20-something founders of Bleetech Innovations, Janhavi Joshi and Nupura Kirloskar, saw an even smarter way to help...
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Kamal Kisan: Empowering marginal farmers with smart, mechanised tools
Given her background, many would call Devi Murthy’s foray into agriculture, fortuitous. For an engineer with a management degree from IIM, whose family business is automotive parts manufacturing, the challenges and plight of farmers were far removed from her immediate environment. Had it not been for a fun project on...
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Navgurukul coders shine amid jobs nightmare
Twenty kilometres from Pune, a part of a college building is bustling with activity as it prepares to host over 200 girls from different parts of the country. They are coming in batches due to quarantine compulsions induced by the pandemic. It’s Navgurukul’s third residential training centre and the second...
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Trashing the stereotypes: Hasiru Dala is empowering waste pickers to become entrepreneurs
Our portfolio company Hasiru Dala Innovations Private Limited is a Waste Management enterprise that focuses on economic justice to create access to markets and predictable livelihoods for waste pickers while delivering environmental impact. Its not-for-profit arm also works on social justice, including identity rights of waste pickers, education for their...
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Pashu Bajaar: Goats on a click
Munni Devi was resigned to a life of deprivation. As a farm labourer on the outskirts of Lucknow, the earnings were meagre. She also had to take care of two grandchildren. Three years back, she became a pashu sakhi (friend of livestock) after receiving training. Since then she has been earning...
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