Drinkwell

This loan may have higher risk but higher impact. Learn more here.

Problem

In Dhaka, Bangladesh, 4 million low income community members access their daily drinking water from unregulated water sources where water sharks charge high prices. Diseases like E. coli and other bacteria and viruses are common, as providers don’t follow quality standards. Additionally, unregulated activities result in inefficient use of precious groundwater, exacerbating a water shortage that disproportionately hurts the poor.

Solution

Drinkwell provides water ATM systems that disburse safe, metered, drinking water. They are partnering with Dhaka’s water utility to retrofit Dhaka’s existing water pump infrastructure and provide safe drinking water directly to low-income households at affordable prices.

Each Drinkwell System can serve up to 2,000+ households. Users use reloadable debit cards to withdraw water through an ATM interface. To date they have installed 10 of these systems and would like to deploy 300 across the city. A video on their work is here

Loan & Use of Impact

The water utility pays Drinkwell a monthly operation & maintenance fee for each system that they install. As such, Drinkwell does not earn revenues for operating and maintaining these sites until each system is online and operational. The $50,000 loan provides initial funding to deploy these systems across Dhaka, unlocking sustainable revenues.