Two University of Connecticut students have launched a business selling much-needed equipment providing solar-based electricity and refrigeration to communities in Africa, Haiti and Nepal.
The challenges for Benjamin Williams, chief executive officer of Innovative-Diffusion LLC, and David Oyanadel, chief technology officer, are immense. The problems start with finding distributors and include operating in less-than-transparent markets in developing countries.
“It’s a huge challenge,” Williams said. “You’re talking about corruption like you’ve never seen. If you don’t have the money to pay, your product is going to stay in the port.”
The company, which is based in Willimantic and has been operating for 10 months, has so far generated a modest $40,000 in revenue, Williams said. It has not raised private capital, he said.
The products include a refrigerated storage unit for medicine that can operate without being connected to a power grid, which can be rare in many communities in developing countries, and a solar-energy generator to charge phones, most laptops and other equipment.
The pair has enlisted the help of Howard Pitkin, former commissioner of the state banking department, who agreed to serve as the company’s advisory chair. Pitkin, who has been teaching at Central Connecticut State University, met Oyanadel when he also taught at the university.
“We take too much for granted in America,” Pitkin said. “It seems to me this effort has the potential of changing a lot of people’s lives.”
Oyanadel conceived the idea for the business when hecould not reach his family when it lost electricity after an earthquake in Chile in 2010.
“We couldn’t make a simple phone call in Wilimantic,” said Williams, who is working toward a graduate degree in business.
Oyanadel, who is pursuing an executive master’s degree, said his family’s home was demolished in the earthquake and countless others also lost electricity. The loss of electricity often led to loss of life, as victims had no access to communications, he said.
But even in non-emergencies, many communities in developing countries don’t have access to electricity because construction of electric grids is costly and often excludes small communities, he said.
“The word ‘necessity’ is really important,” Oyanadel said. “We take electricity for granted.”
The company also can serve to inspire young people to solve problems in their communities, he said.
“Our concept is to make a living, but at the same time create a service people can use and benefit from,” Oyanadel said.
The business model for the startup includes partnering with non-governmental organizations and nonprofits such as Africaphilantropies, a Norwich-based charitable group that has distributed Innovative-Diffusion equipment in Togo in western Africa. It has also partnered with Clifton, N.J.-based Embrace Relief, which brings together volunteers who collaborate on humanitarian aid and disaster relief work.
Africaphilantropies was established by Zato Kadambaya, a native of Togo who studied engineering at UConn and is now head of the math and science department at New London High School.
He said he met Williams at a coffee shop a year ago and the two struck up a conversation with the common starter, “What do you do?”
“My interest is in helping Africa,” Kadambaya said.
Without electricity, youngsters in small towns in African nations cannot read or study, limiting their education and opportunities, he said.
“When the sun goes down, that’s it,” Kadambaya said.
