Distributed power, water and entrepreneurship. Could that be a winning combination for developing countries? Dean Kamen, inventor of the Segway, and Iqbal Quadir, the founder of Grameen Phone, the largest cell phone company in Bangladesh, appear to think so. I have to admit, it sounds intriguing.
Erick Schonfeld, Business 2.0 Magazine editor-at-large reports that:
An estimated 1.1 billion people in the world don’t have access to clean drinking water, and an estimated 1.6 billion don’t have electricity. Those figures add up to a big problem for the world—and an equally big opportunity for entrepreneurs. To solve the problem, [Kamen has] invented two devices, each about the size of a washing machine that can provide much-needed power and clean water in rural villages.
Kamen is not alone in his quest. He’s been joined by Iqbal Quadir, the founder of Grameen Phone, the largest cell phone company in Bangladesh…Quadir’s startup, Cambridge, Mass.-based Emergence Energy, is negotiating with Kamen’s Deka Research and Development to license the technology. Quadir then hopes to raise $30 million in venture capital to start producing the power machines.
The real invention here, though, may be the economic model that Kamen and Quadir hope to use to distribute the machines. It is fashioned after Grameen Phone’s business, where village entrepreneurs (mostly women) are given micro-loans to purchase a cell phone and service. The women, in turn, charge other villagers to make calls. “We have 200,000 rural entrepreneurs who are selling telephone services in their communities,” notes Quadir. “The vision is to replicate that with electricity.”
“Isn’t that better for democracy?” Quadir asks. “We see a shortage of democracy in the world, and we are surprised. If you strengthen the economic hands of people, you will foster real democracy.”
Mitch Shapiro at 9:57 PM|Comments(0)
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