E-Health Clinics in India

This is a health clinic in rural India using an interesting combination of clean water and e-healthcare. This business is being incubated by Ashoka, here is the original press release.

VisionSpring's model spreading to Water Purification

Florence Cassassuce was a CNN Hero finalist and a World Bank Development Marketplace winner and according to an entry from a Changemakers competition last year, her next step is to turn her UV water purification bucket into a micro-franchise business based on the VisionSpring's model.  

At the time of the competition her idea was in its infancy so it might not have received a lot of attention.  She's dreaming big and coming to the table with refreshing transparency but it's too early to tell what is real and what is emerging.  She has a great product, now can she distribute it widely.

Water purification franchises have proven to be very successful models in the U.S. (perhaps too much so--producing incredible amounts of plastic waste from individual bottles of water) so there might be elements to borrow from the private sector in addition to someone like VisionSpring who functions with a much lower price point and technology.  Larger purchases such as a UV water filter might require options for buying on credit, savings plans, or collaborative purchases which could prove to be a model for many technology, productivity-enhancing products.

Do you know of other microfranchise models for water purification and distribution? 

 

OneRoof swinging for the fence

OneRoof is a for-profit social enterprise that seeks to deliver 9 essential services in one franchised operation: Information Tech. and Communications, Financial Services, Education, Energy, Health, Clean Water, Sanitation, Agricultural Technologies, and Employment Generation.

I heard Jennifer Ellingson, a senior associate, give a presentation about OneRoof at BYU last November and was quite impressed. They currently operate 20 stores themselves in Mexico and India, having yet to sell franchises outright. I would consider them to still be in the testing phase of operations and launch although I believe they have raised a significant amount of money for their initial growth. I think the are finding very different challenges in Mexico and India which is modifying their model. Looking over their website it appears that they have been able to attract a very talented team which bodes well.

I like their model of being a broker of services as far as being a branded location that can be a point of distribution for a number of partners instead of providing all the services themselves. I have no sense of how well they are delivering on their mission, I have not seen them in the press much and their blog has not been updated since they secured their second round of funding. Their aim to function completely as a for-profit venture will make them an interesting case study in evaluating the feasibility of Gates' creative capitalism and Yunus' social business.

Regarding not knowing their current status: what do you think about transparency and reporting in the citizen sector? How much should social businesses report about their struggles?

Ceramic Water Filters

Today as I was driving I listened to an old podcast from GlobeShakers from the Stanford Center for Social Innovation, the guest speaker being Don Gould speaking about Pure Water for All.

In the interview Don describes a microfranchise model for manufacturing and distributing the ceramic water filters. It sounds like a great model: using locally available materials, creating jobs for local communities with a tremendous social return on investment. This interview was back in 2005, does anyone have an update on their project?

Hippo Roller Alternative

I recently came across this product called the Q-Drum which is quite similar to the Hippo Roller I highlighted in a previous post. The Q-Drum has been around since 1997 when it was in an issue of TIME. A retailer could market test the two products side by side in a given area and see which is more suitable or perhaps both would be successful products. A microfranchise in association with this product would be a manufacturing operation.

Time-saving, pain-saving water gathering

When I was doing research in Ghana in 2006 about the 'bothersome' health problems that cut down on women's productivity one of the most reported problems was 'waist pains' or, what we in the U.S. would call, lower back pain. Although not a physician, my diagnosis was that the problem was a result of the way women lifted heavy items, i.e. bending at the waist instead of using their legs. One of the most common items lifted in this way to be put on the head for carrying was water.

The Hippo Water Roller is a simple, easily manufacutred product that can increase productivity by decreasing the amount of time expended to gather water and by decreasing the number of sick days or shortened work days due to lower back pain. Hippo Water Roller has franchised a production facility that could be set up in a myriad of locations. There is a link on the website for contacting them about specific costs and setup.

I think this is another example of a simple business that could piggyback on the structure of microfinance. Clients could use their loan to buy the Hipporoller franchise. I wonder how actively HippoRoller is promoting their product and if they are trying to sell their franchised production facility to microfinance institutions to then sell to their borrowers.