Bharti Airtel Announces New Corporate Structure To Sharpen Focus On Digital India

* Brings focus on four distinct verticals - Digital, India, International and Infrastructure 

Bharti Airtel (“Airtel”), India’s premier communication solutions provider, today announced a new corporate structure. This is expected to sharpen the focus of the company in driving the rapidly unfolding digital opportunity in India while enabling it to unlock value.   

The new structure envisages Airtel Digital Limited folding into the listed entity, Bharti Airtel. This will now house all of the digital assets spanning Wynk Music, Airtel X stream, Airtel Thanks, Mitra Payments platform used by a million retailers, Airtel Ads, Airtel IQ, Airtel Secure, Airtel Cloud and all future digital products and services. 

The digital ambition of Bharti Airtel Limited is closely intertwined with the spine that connectivity provides across the country. It is therefore intended to house all the telecom businesses in a newly created entity, Airtel Limited – a wholly owned subsidiary of Bharti Airtel Limited. Bharti Telemedia, the 100% arm operating DTH services will sit alongside Airtel Limited for now. It is intended to eventually fold the DTH business into Airtel Limited to move towards the NDCP vision of converged services to customers. The company has moved the government to seek clarity on licensing policy given that carriage i.e telecom and DTH is currently being regulated and managed under two separate ministries of Communications and I&B respectively. 

Airtel Payments Bank will remain a separate entity under Bharti Airtel and work closely with the growing customer base to play a pivotal role in realising the digital opportunity that payments and financial services provides.  

All of the company’s infrastructure businesses such as Nxtra and Indus Towers will continue to remain in separate entities as they are currently. So will International subsidiaries and affiliates. 

The Board in its meeting held today approved the scheme enabling the company to file for all  statutory approvals to give effect to the proposed rearrangement.  

Sunil Bharti Mittal, Chairman, Bharti Airtel said: “The new structure sets the exciting future course for Bharti Airtel and provides focus on the four distinct businesses – Digital, India, International and Infrastructure, each, in a razor sharp way. We believe this will provide agility, expertise and operational rigour to serve our customers brilliantly while providing flexibility to unlock value for our shareholders. This structure will serve us well over the coming years and is a win-win for all stakeholders.” 

About Bharti Airtel 

Headquartered in India, Airtel is a global communications solutions provider with over 458 mn customers in 18 countries across South Asia and Africa. The company ranks amongst the top three mobile operators globally and its networks cover over two billion people. Airtel is India’s largest integrated communications solutions provider and the second largest mobile operator in Africa. Airtel’s retail portfolio includes high speed 4G/4.5G mobile broadband, Airtel Xstream Fiber that promises speeds up to 1 Gbps with convergence across linear and on-demand entertainment, streaming services spanning music and video, digital payments and financial services. For enterprise customers, Airtel offers a gamut of solutions that includes secure connectivity, cloud and data centre services, cyber security, IoT, Ad Tech and cloud based communication. 

By Digitising Over 3.5 Lakhs Businesses In 6 Months, myBillBook Fuels The Growth Of SMBs In Karnataka

* myBillBook is the flagship product of FloBiz, a Bengaluru based technology company that aims to accelerate the growth of SMBs across the country. 

Bengaluru based FloBiz, India's fastest growing SMB technology company launches “myBillBook” - a simple to use billing and accounting app for small & medium businesses. It is available on both mobile and desktop. myBillBook provides an easy-to-use and secure experience to business owners with a seamless sign-up process – enabling digitisation of their business operations in a matter of minutes. 

myBillBook offers a complete billing and accounting solution on a mobile phone enabling businesses to digitise their entire business operations. It is currently available in English, Hindi, Gujarati, Tamil and will soon be released in Kannada.  

myBillBook helps both GST and non-GST businesses in creating bills, recording purchases & expenses, maintaining stock and managing payables/ receivables directly from their mobile phones or computers. This highest-rated business app also generates important business reports like profit & loss statements, sales summary, party ledger reports, GSTR reports, etc. that help business owners take effective decisions on the go. myBillBook also supports real-time data transfer between mobile & desktop with an advanced security system. The app offers multi-user functionality to easily give usage permission to business partners, accountants and organisation staff. 

myBillBook has helped over 3.5 lakh businesses in the state to go digital in the past six months. The product has been meticulously designed from a business owner’s perspective. It is so simple to use that business owners do not need any prior accounting knowledge to begin using. Keeping user convenience in mind, the product is directly integrated with WhatsApp, making it easy for business owners to share invoices & purchase orders, send payment reminders with payment links to their buyers or suppliers.  

Commenting on the launch of myBillBook, Mr Rahul Raj, Founder & CEO – FloBiz, said, “SMBs form the backbone of our growing economy. After the Covid-19 pandemic, it is clearer than ever that we must focus on enhancing domestic production and exports - the only way to do that is through the help of technology. At FloBiz, we built myBillBook with a single goal - to accelerate the growth of SMBs in the country through digitisation. We firmly believe that it’s the only way to achieve the mission of creating an Aatmnirbhar Bharat which was set by our honourable PM.” 

About FloBiz: 

FloBiz is India’s first neo business platform that aims to accelerate the growth of small & medium enterprises through digitisation. The company recently raised USD 10 million in a series-A round from Elevation Capital and has an existing investment backing from Greenoaks Capital and Beenext. In the seed stage round, the company raised USD 3 million in 2019. Founded in 2019 by IIT & BITS alumni, the startup is chasing the mission of digitising SMBs that will contribute to the building of an Aatmanirbhar Bharat.   

LinkedIn launches Sales Insights, A New Data Analytics Platform For Smarter Sales Planning

LinkedIn, the world's largest professional network, today announced the launch of LinkedIn Sales Insights (LSI), a new data analytics platform that allows Sales Operations (Ops) leaders and teams to tap into LinkedIn data at scale and transform their sales planning. This new addition to the LinkedIn Sales Solutions portfolio offers reliable, people-sourced data to help Sales Ops professionals size potential opportunities, source new accounts, and become trusted advisors to their sales leaders.

Amid the growing distance between buyers and sellers today in the virtual world of work, real-time data and relationship intelligence have become critical for smarter sales planning. Powered by data from LinkedIn’s global network of 740+ million members, LinkedIn Sales Insights offers clear visibility into the size and fast-growing nature of departments, functions, and accounts. This allows sellers to understand where their sales teammates have strong relationships, and align their teams and strategies towards the most revenue-generating accounts. Aimed at bringing buyers and sellers closer in today’s virtual reality, LinkedIn Sales Insights will help businesses and sellers to:

Focus on the right accounts and expand into new markets: With raw data at scale, LSI creates real-time insights to spotlight the size and growth of key accounts, regions, and territories so teams can hone in on their target audiences. 

Ensure smarter sales planning: The unique, people-powered nature of the data helps customers uncover the insights they need to build better books of business, strategically prioritize accounts, and ensure sellers have continued opportunities to hit their targets. 

Commenting on the launch of this new platform, Abhai Singh, India Head, Sales Solutions at LinkedIn said, “As virtual selling continues to overhaul the sales ecosystem, real-time data and insights are increasingly critical for sales planning today. With LinkedIn Sales Insights, our goal is to strengthen the buyer-seller relationship so businesses can shift their focus from ‘products they sell’ to the ‘problems they solve’. The platform will empower Sales Operations leaders with data and relationship intelligence to unlock lucrative leads and plan with ease and confidence in today’s ever-changing market.”

LinkedIn Sales Insights allows sellers to identify and size potential opportunities, get a clearer view of the market, and plan more confidently.

About LinkedIn

LinkedIn connects the world’s professionals to make them more productive and successful and transforms the way companies hire, learn, market, and sell. Our vision is to create economic opportunity for every member of the global workforce through the ongoing development of the world’s first Economic Graph. LinkedIn has nearly 740+ million members and has offices around the globe.

Lenovo Introduces As-a-Service Solution For Hosted Desktops With Nutanix

* Lenovo TruScale™ for Hosted Desktops with Nutanix1 provides the simplicity and flexibility of the cloud with infrastructure on-premises for the evolving hybrid workforce    

* Available for a single monthly price covering the client devices, datacenter systems and necessary software and services with a single point of contact for support

* Fraser Health Authority turns to Lenovo and Nutanix to ramp up remote work capabilities in rapid response to COVID-19

Today, Lenovo (HKSE: 992) (ADR: LNVGY) Infrastructure Solutions Group (ISG) with Nutanix announces an As-a-Service solution for Hosted Desktops to help IT decision makers thrive in the new remote hybrid workforce model. According to Lenovo’s recently released “Future of Work and Digital Transformation” study, 83 percent of businesses expect post-pandemic work to be remote at least half the time. Lenovo TruScale™, Lenovo’s first solution for Hosted Desktops with Nutanix, provides companies with a complete and more secure remote work solution. A choice of Lenovo client devices is offered, such as thin clients and PCs, choice of Citrix and other virtual desktop environments, and ThinkAgile HX Series (powered by Nutanix), all licensed to the end user and managed as-a-service. The complete Hosted Desktops solution provides cloud-like simplicity and on-premises performance, with the convenience of a single monthly payment and single point of contact for support.

“Many organizations are modernizing their IT infrastructures to support the growing demands remote work continues to place on their IT systems,” said Kirk Skaugen, Executive Vice President, Lenovo Group and President of Infrastructure Solutions Group. “We are seeing a shift where customers are more interested in as-a-service models to help offset the investment associated with upgrading their IT systems quickly. Lenovo’s collaboration with Nutanix provides customers with a more secure, Hosted Desktop as-a-service solution that is easy to secure, deploy and manage with minimal up-front costs.”

Over the past few years and especially during this global pandemic, industries such as healthcare require the ability to complete more administrative and clinical activities remotely, with added safety and security. Fraser Health Authority, one of Canada’s largest and fastest growing health authorities servicing 1.8 million people in British Columbia, revitalized their data center with Lenovo and Nutanix to ensure high-quality patient services during a province-wide lockdown.

“We see that remote connectivity is more than just a short-term response to the COVID-19 pandemic. It’s part of our long-term strategy to ensure we can deliver vital health services no matter what,” said Wesley Kampff, Portfolio Manager, Fraser Health Authority. “To streamline maintenance and support, our preference was to engage a single vendor to deliver the workstations and data center solutions. We were confident that replacing our traditional three-tier architecture with the cutting-edge ThinkAgile HX hyperconverged platform, with Nutanix, would offer the performance, availability and scalability we wanted” added Kampff.

Secure Desktop Delivery with Cloud-Like Consumption Frees Up IT Resources

Data security continues to rank as the topmost time-consuming challenge among IT departments, especially in a remote work environment. Designed to support a breadth of industries, including healthcare, education and SMB, Lenovo’s TruScale for Hosted Desktops with Nutanix solutions provide cloud-like capabilities with infrastructure on premises, perfect for companies with data privacy compliance or regulatory concerns. Lenovo offers predictable costs through monthly billing to accelerate time-to-value and reduce upfront business expenses. The full solution is available immediately, which includes Lenovo ThinkAgile HX systems supported by software stacks in partnership with Nutanix and Citrix and Lenovo thin clients or PCs, all available via Lenovo TruScale as-a-service: 

The simplicity of a fully complete and managed solution: Incorporating devices, data center infrastructure and infrastructure managed services, the Hosted Desktops solution provides predictable, fixed monthly charges, and reduces up-front investment to better align costs with business outcomes.

Improved productivity: Lenovo TruScale™ for Hosted Desktops with Nutanix reduces ongoing management costs within the hosted environment. Lenovo’s services team handles all aspects of the engagement from Professional Services that helps customers right-size and design a successful migration strategy, through to the end-of-life asset removal. Lenovo Managed Services ensures the infrastructure operates smoothly 24/7, freeing up IT administrators’ time to focus on strategic priorities.

Reduce infrastructure management costs by as much as 62%. Lenovo TruScale for Hosted Desktops with Nutanix, running on reliable ThinkAgile HX systems with Nutanix      cloud platform software, reduces price per user by co-locating compute, storage and virtualization on a single cluster thus significantly simplifying operations.

“As businesses worldwide look for the way forward beyond this pandemic, they need technology partners to help them embrace the future of work and thrive in a hybrid work model which will be the standard for many organizations,” said Tarkan Maner, Chief Commercial Officer at Nutanix. “Lenovo’s strategic collaboration with Nutanix provides customers an end-to-end solution一from the hybrid cloud data centers to digital workspaces一to empower employees wherever they are, while also offering businesses a simplified consumption model through Lenovo TruScale Infrastructure Services, along with increased flexibility, scalability, performance, and security to navigate the challenges of a distributed workforce.”

Built on Lenovo’s Enterprise ThinkSystem and ThinkAgile portfolio, Lenovo TruScale Infrastructure Services can tackle any workload or deployment size and can scale for ultimate flexibility.

Visit TruScale Hosted Desktops for more information on this as-a-service new solution. 

LENOVO, LENOVO TRUSCALE, THINKAGILE and THINKSYSTEM are trademarks of Lenovo.

1 Hosted Desktop solution runs on Lenovo infrastructure.

About Lenovo

Lenovo (HKSE: 992) (ADR: LNVGY) is a US$50 billion Fortune Global 500 company, with 63,000 employees and operating in 180 markets around the world. Focused on a bold vision to deliver smarter technology for all, we are developing world-changing technologies that create a more inclusive, trustworthy, and sustainable digital society. By designing, engineering and building the world’s most complete portfolio of smart devices and infrastructure, we are also leading an Intelligent Transformation – to create better experiences and opportunities for millions of customers around the world. 

India Health Fund On-Boards AI-Driven TrakItNow Tech And Stellar Diagnostics To Strengthen India’s Fight Against Infectious Diseases

In a bid to bolster India’s fight against infectious diseases, India Health Fund (IHF), a Tata Trusts initiative, today announced the on-boarding of two start-ups – AI-driven, TrakItNow Technologies and, affordable TB rapid testing creators, Stellar Diagnostics (SDIL) – to its portfolio of innovations. IHF will support the development and deployment of affordable, breakthrough innovations, point-of-care health technologies and digital innovations to prevent, control, and join hands to tackle infectious diseases.

With TrakItNow Technologies and Stellar Diagnostics, IHF continues to bridge the gap at various stages of innovation by validating, adapting existing solutions to support multi-disease platform innovations, and deploying these to achieve patient outcomes.

Mr. Madhav Joshi, CEO, India Health Fund, said, “We are identifying and supporting breakthrough innovations like tech-enabled surveillance, diagnostics and other point of care solutions that define the way forward in tackling infectious diseases. TrakItNow is an IoT and artificial intelligence based solution in development stage with immense potential to impact mosquito borne diseases and Stellar Diagnostics is working on a first of its kind triaging molecular diagnostic tool for diagnosing Tuberculosis, the format of which can be used for other diseases when ready. We acknowledge the participation of all our partners who have played a critical role in evaluating and recommending such crucial innovations with potential for multiplex platform solutions.”

From augmenting national efforts to fight malaria and TB, IHF, in line with the objectives of the Government of India and UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), aims to accelerate India’s progress towards the elimination of these infectious diseases. With its partners, IHF is also adapting existing solutions to battle COVID-19, and working towards faster integration of innovations into our healthcare systems to tackle TB, vector-borne and airborne diseases 

TrakItNow Technologies’ disruptive smart mosquito surveillance and control system – Moskeet -- uses Internet of Things (IOT), and Artificial Intelligence (AI), automating the process, by providing real-time data with higher accuracy for effective control of mosquito-borne diseases,enabling a scientific and data-driven approach to mitigating infectious diseases. Mosquito control relies upon accurate estimates of the vector (mosquito) population to justify and implement timely vector-control responses to restrict disease transmission to humans. Currently, Moskeet is the only holistic and scalable solution of mosquito surveillance that operates autonomously and provides real-time data both by location and species.

Mr. Satish Cherukumalli, Co-Founder & CEO, TrakItNow, said, “Mosquito-borne diseases infect 4 crore people every year, and 95% of population in India resides in Malaria endemic areas. Moskeet platform collects real-time data and provides analytics for effective control of mosquito-populations, disease outbreak risk analysis and pesticide effectiveness.  IHF support helps to expand the solution capabilities to major medically relevant mosquito species in India covering diseases like malaria, dengue, chikungunya, filaria and Japanese Encephalitis”.

With IHF’s support, Stellar Diagnostics (SDIL) is developing a novel TB solution that allows rapid, affordable testing in 20 minutes. This antibody-based point-of-care TB screening test requires no laboratory infrastructure and minimal training of health care workers. IHF is facilitating the improvement in test accuracy, through field trials, in two phases necessary for regulatory approval, and establish the test as rapid and affordable -- by adapting it to finger-prick blood testing.

Dr. Suman Laal, Chief Scientific Officer, SDIL, said, “IHF is supporting Stellar Diagnostics India in the development of an innovative, affordable, lateral-flow POC TB Triage test that detects antibodies to specific and sensitive peptides of TB. Implementation of the Triage test will enable TB Control programs to direct their limited resources towards providing increased access to accurate molecular diagnostic TB tests”.

About SDIL:

Stellar Diagnostics India Private Limited (SDIL) is based out of the Regional Centre for Biotechnology, Faridabad. SDIL is primarily involved in developing highly accurate and affordable diagnostic tests based on identified and patented peptides.

About TrakItNow:

TrakItNow is a Hyderabad, Telangana based company using Internet of Things (IoT) and artificial intelligence (AI) enabled solutions across various sectors, including public health, for greater social impact. It also focuses on solutions in the areas of public safety and connected vehicles.

About India Health Fund:

India Health Fund is a collaborative initiative, seeded by Tata Trusts and the Global Fund, conceived to:

Accelerate India’s progress towards the elimination of infectious diseases in line with the objectives of the Government of India and UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), by identifying and supporting the development of breakthrough solutions which help accelerate eradication of these diseases.

Aggregate funds and deploy resources to finance the development of these solutions to enable better outcomes in diagnosis, treatment, control, and monitoring of infectious diseases.

Collaborate with the public and private sectors to develop and scale up new solutions, business models and financing mechanisms. For details see: http://www.indiahealthfund.org/

About Tata Trusts:

Since inception in 1892, Tata Trusts, India’s oldest philanthropic organisation, has played a pioneering role in bringing about an enduring difference in the lives of the communities it serves. Guided by the principles and the vision of proactive philanthropy of the Founder, Jamsetji Tata, the Trusts’ purpose is to catalyse development in the areas of health, nutrition, education, water, sanitation and hygiene, livelihood, digital transformation, migration and urban habitat, social justice and inclusion, environment and energy, skill development, sports, and arts and culture. The Trusts’ programmes, achieved through direct implementation, partnerships and grant making, are marked by innovations, relevant to the country. 

Toyota Kirloskar Motor Launches Covid Vaccination Centre (CVC) At The Workplace

In their continued efforts to safeguard the health and safety of employees, Toyota Kirloskar Motor (TKM) has launched COVID Vaccination Centre (CVC) at workplace for seamless vaccination program of its employees in line with government guidelines. TKM is one of first companies to have its occupational health department empanelled as workplace COVID Vaccination Centre (CVC) by district health authority.

To promote a healthy and safe workplace environment, TKM has undertaken several preventive measures to ensure the overall wellbeing of its employees. As vaccination is crucial in the fight against the pandemic, TKM is taking its part in the society’s efforts to contain the coronavirus, has initiated actions to make it convenient and maximize vaccine adoption among employees in coordination with local health authorities and further accelerated government’s vaccination drive.

Commenting on the initiative, Mr. G Shankara, Vice President, Human Resources and Services Group, TKM said, “At TKM, we pay utmost importance to the health and safety of all our stakeholders and especially our employees. We have continuously  gauged and introduced required welfare measures for our employees and their families. This time around, TKM, as a responsible corporate, has introduced COVID Vaccination Centre (CVC) at workplace to ease the process of vaccination for our employees. As a result, our employees are making full use of the CVC to get vaccinated as per their will and convenience, avoiding the need to go outside the plant for the same.

Toyota has been undertaking multiple measures including educating employees on the benefits of vaccination, simplifying the process that are conducive for its team members. To support a wider range of local communities in their fight against COVID, beyond our own workforce, the company is also looking to extend the support for establishing a similar facility in Bidadi industrial area for Toyota group companies, suppliers  and even neighbouring industries.”

COVID Vaccination Centre has been set-up as per the guidelines in coordination with district health authorities and in adherence to standard operating procedures for vaccination, being mindful of the entire demand and supply of vaccine in India. All aspects of vaccination at workplaces, such as registration of beneficiaries, availability of infrastructure, and facility of on-the-spot registration are made available to employees. So far 175 eligible employees are vaccinated at CVC.

TKM has been at the forefront in consistently taking effective measures to counter the outbreak and will continue to support and take adequate measures for the safety of its key stakeholders, healthcare workers and the community. The company has introduced multiple policies and programs that granted employees with paid leaves for the absence due to infection or quarantine. The company also provided special Covid-19 insurance coverage to employees and family, Covid care kit to the families of our employees (Sanjeevini Kit) and nearby community, dedicated hotline services along with extensive CSR support to the frontline workers of the Government of Karnataka amongst other support.  

H&M Foundation, Social Alpha Announce Loopworm And Swachha Ecosolutions Among Top 5 Start-Ups With Innovative Waste Mgt

Phool, Zeroplast Labs, Loopworm, Swachha Ecosolutions and MuddleArt  have been announced as the top 5 winning start-ups of ‘Techtonic – Innovations in Waste Management’, a joint initiative of Social Alpha and the H&M Foundation. This programme is part of the Saamuhika Shakti initiative by H&M Foundation in India. The program envisions to create an enabling ecosystem stack for innovators and entrepreneurs developing solutions to accelerate waste management, processing and improve the overall quality of life of the informal sector in India.

The top 5 winning start-ups of Techtonic – Innovations in Waste Management are focused on developing technology innovations to move the needle towards a circular economy and enhance the lives and livelihoods of the informal sector:

MuddleArt, New Delhi: MuddleArt is creating a systemic approach to manage pre-consumer textile waste in India.  The start-up has created backward and forward linkages to streamline the flow of pre-consumer textile waste and create recyclable material and upcycled products.

Phool, Kanpur: Phool is driving climate action and creating a circular economy by upcycling floral waste into cruelty-free bio alternative to animal leather called ‘Fleather’ which will cut down several traditional downstream leather tanning processes that are highly unsustainable.

Loopworm, Bengaluru: Loopworm is producing sustainable food & feed by bringing food waste back into the circular loop. The start-up is doing this by creating an extremely protein rich diet for fisheries and poultry farms by farming insects to feed them using food waste which currently lands in landfills.

Swachha Ecosolutions, Bengaluru:  Swachha Ecosolutions has developed an innovation that processes formulated grades of multi-layered plastic and low value film waste; and adding them to asphalt for road construction. The start-up is also providing waste management consulting services and recycling waste streams across businesses, commercial complexes, municipalities and residential societies.

ZeroPlast Labs, Pune: ZeroPlast Labs is actively working on developing sustainable materials to replace plastics. ZeroPlast collects and upcycles biomass waste into compostable bioplastics and composites, which can be used as a sustainable alternative to oil-based and non-biodegradable single use plastics.

The winning start-ups will join Social Alpha’s Waste Innovations Accelerator – a one year immersive venture development program where they will be provided with access to resources to become growth-ready.  The support includes 1. Market Validation Lab: an opportunity to implement their business in a new geography with Urban Local Bodies (ULBs), public or private institutions for a year to help them validate and refine their business model and prepare for scale ​2. Immersive Lab: each start-up will be provided support in marketing and digitization of their operations 3. Technology and Business Incubation Support: winners will get access to Social Alpha’s incubation offerings such as mentorship by a set of qualified global and local experts in the waste management sector, go-to-marketing strategy support, opportunity to pitch to a large investor and donor network and potential opportunity to access Social Alpha’s seed support.

The objective of the Accelerator is to enable the start-ups to overcome high operational barriers in scaling to new locations, and successfully enter new geographies.

Maria Bystedt, Strategy Lead, H&M Foundation, said, “We are so happy to support these winning innovations and are excited to follow the entrepreneurs on their journey. Innovation is fundamental to improve the waste management system, but it is also crucial to improve the life of waste pickers. By reducing the amounts of waste that end up in landfills waste pickers are true heroes, and new technologies can increase their income opportunities as well as highlighting the recognition they deserve”.

Manoj Kumar, Founder and CEO, Social Alpha, said, “The need to usher innovations all along the value chain is crucial to solve the complexities of waste management problems. The winning innovations have demonstrated the potential to create impact and scale across geographies. Our Waste Innovations Accelerator has been designed to help these start-ups overcome barriers of entering into new markets by convening cross-sectoral collaboration with Urban Local Bodies, private institutions and civil society”.

The winners were selected from over 100 applications, based on a set of criteria with the focus being broadly on technology innovation, impact, operational scalability, and business sustainability. The applications went through multiple rounds of evaluations by an external expert committee and a jury panel. The top 10 finalists then presented to a Jury of experts from across different disciplines, with a waste management background leading to the selection of winners.

About H&M Foundation:

The H&M Foundation is an independent non-profit global foundation headquartered in Stockholm, Sweden. It is privately funded by the Stefan Persson family, founders and main owners of the H&M group. Founded to accelerate progress towards the UN Sustainable Development Goals 2030, H&M Foundation uses collaboration and innovation to co-create, fund and share solutions for the world’s most urgent challenges. 

About Social Alpha:

Social Alpha is a multistage innovation curation and venture development platform for science and technology start-ups that address the most critical social, economic and environmental challenges through the power of entrepreneurship and market-creating innovations. Since its inception in 2016, Social Alpha has supported more 150 start-ups including 40+ seed investments.