SMAJI - personalized water monitoring and delivery

SMAJI is the Uber of clean water. It solves the coordination problem that exacerbates water scarcity and poor water quality in intermittently supplied water systems.  SMAJI connects those in the water system that have excess storage to those who have no or limited storage via mobile water vendors. Cloud-connected, no-contact sensors on tanks allow continuous monitoring of water availability and facilitate clean water exchanges.

The promise of SMAJI is that planning ahead for water reduces cost and contamination risk. Identifying a secure backup water supply before tanks run low puts the consumer back in control allowing them to source the water they need for everyday tasks and to protect their families from unwanted trips to the hospital. With SMAJI, we have an opportunity to transform the way water works in Kenya and across the African Diaspora.

More than one billion individuals globally are served by intermittent water systems.  In the Kenyan context:

• Tank owners want timely, affordable, safe water deliveries when intermittently supplied piped water runs out.  At the moment, the wait for a mobile water vendor can be anywhere from 4 hours to 4 days. When water is delivered, charges are assessed for a full tank no matter the start level.  There are also no guarantees on the quality of the water source.
• Mobile water delivery vendors lack a mechanism for optimizing the number of deliveries per trip.  Half-filled water trucks are a safety hazard and risk tipping over from the force of water being sloshed around. Drivers routinely dump clean water to allow safe travel to another location with more customers. Mobile vendors also want payment upon delivery. Tank owners may wait for a week before they pay outstanding balances.
• Mobile vendors primarily rely on private borehole owners who have limited water availability given declining groundwater levels in certain areas. There is an over reliance on a few borehole suppliers. It takes 45 minutes for a mobile water vendor to fill a 10,000 L tank and after waiting in line for  hours.

• We serve the residents in informal settlements who walk to a central kiosk to meet their daily needs. Smart tanks send alerts when levels are low so that refills can be made in a timely manner. Unreliable kiosks get used less over the long run.  No one wants to waste time traveling to a non-functioning water point.
• We work with businesses such as sports clubs, schools and apartments with multiple tanks and use metering as a starting point for facility water audits. Their needs include verifying bills from the water utility, understanding what points in their facilities are drawing the most water and implementing targeted strategies to reduce water use.
•  We also serve water truck vendors by coordinating their approach to tank refills, ensuring that they maximize deliveries per trip. Half-filled water trucks are a safety hazard, and subject to roll-overs, so vendors prefer to dump a half-filled tank with clean water than travel with it long distance to another location.

SMAJI  is comprised of i) cloud-connected smart tanks, ii) a software backend that ingests data from smart tanks and coordinates the ordering and delivery of water and iii) mobile and web user interfaces.

Internet connected smart tanks that are self-monitoring, report water levels every 10 minutes.  Data from smart tanks is stored in a database that is a part of the backend infrastructure and analyzed further. When water levels have fallen so that only 25% (or some other agreed minimum) remains, an order can be automatically placed that allows the nearest available clean water pod to accept an order and dispatch delivery via a mobile vendor.

Machine learning algorithms are used to infer water volumes withdrawn from and supplied to tanks and to forecast water availability across communities. 

End users interact with the system via mobile app or SMS. Clean water pods and kiosk managers also have access to a web dashboard that allows them to view and analyze the operation of multiple tanks.

Innovation is embedded in three areas of our solution -  i) the creation of smart tanks, ii) the use of smart tanks to support a new networked business model for water delivery and iii) the creation of clean water pods that maximize the use of harvested rainwater as a new source of clean water.

Smart tanks are created by retrofitting normal plastic tanks with the ultrasonic level sensors that are typically used in automotive range finding applications.  Instead of measuring the distance between a car and a wall, the sensors provide a contactless approach for measuring the distance between the lid of a water tank and the water surface. At the moment, if a homeowner wants to know how much water is in a tank, they might knock on the side to make a guess, or climb to the top and take a look in.

Smart tanks allow water orders to be placed automatically, as soon as low levels are detected. Orders are sent to the nearest clean water pod which then dispatches a mobile vendor to fulfill the delivery. Pods are located on accessible properties that have excess water capacity.

Clean water pods are prioritized in locations that are prone to flooding and that produce an average of 50,000 L of rainwater per week. Overall, our solution is data driven, employing the use of AI algorithms to estimate tank consumption and supply from water levels and to forecast the rain supply to clean water pods.

SMAJI  is comprised of i) cloud-connected smart tanks, ii) a software backend that ingests data from smart tanks and coordinates the ordering and delivery of water and iii) mobile and web user interfaces.

Internet connected smart tanks are self-monitoring and report water levels every 10 minutes.  Data from smart tanks is stored in a database that is a part of the backend infrastructure and analyzed further. When water levels have fallen so that only 25% (or some other agreed minimum) remains, an order can be automatically placed that allows the nearest available clean water pod to accept an order and dispatch delivery via a mobile vendor.

Machine learning algorithms are used to infer water volumes withdrawn from and supplied to tanks and to forecast water availability across communities.  This kind of data and information collected from water users provides an unprecedented level of insight about consumer behavior in intermittent water systems. This data does not exist and will be invaluable also for improving how the municipal system operates.

SMAJI is directly tackling the problem of increasing and simplifying access to clean water.  Solving this problem will mean the average urban resident experiences improved water availability and a reduced risk of waterborne illnesses. It also means we will demonstrably increase the volume of clean water added to the system.

Metrics including the volume of clean water produced and delivered and average tank refill time are the key indicators that will be tracked to monitor the extent to which SMAJI is increasing clean water availability and reducing the potential for risky purchasing decisions from mobile water vendors with unverified sources. Nairobi Currently has a daily piped water shortfall of 200 million L per day. In five years, SMAJI’s smart pods will reduce this shortfall by more than 20 % as increasing harvested capacity is brought online.

SMAJI is being piloted in Nairobi, Kenya. The water monitoring and delivery service  covers both the informal settlement areas and residential areas with in-home access to piped water.

In the informal settlement areas, we currently serve roughly 1,000 individuals per week through six kiosks equipped with smart tanks. The tanks are co-owned by Nairobi Water and Oxfam.

In residential areas, we are serve roughly 50 individuals through 10 smart tanks (average household size of five).

Over the next year, we want to scale the number of residential individuals  served to 5,000 (via 1,000 tanks) and the number of informal settlement kiosk visitors to 100,000 (via 500 smart tanks).

In five years, we want to scale the number of residential individuals served in Kenya to 1M (via 200,000 smart tanks) and the number of informal settlement kiosk to 1 M (via 50,000 smart tanks) In 5 years, we also want to have expanded service to Nigeria effectively serving at least 1 million individuals.

Our goal over the long term is to scale SMAJI across sub-Saharan Africa, ensuring clean water fills the gaps left by intermittent water systems.  Progress in three key areas will help us to do this - i) becoming the provider of choice for home water deliveries, ii) scaling up the implementation of water harvesting pods and iii) streamlining our operations through partnerships with sensor vendors, tank manufacturers, mobile water vendors and financial institutions.

Over the next year, we want to set up 100 harvesting pods with combined delivery capacity of 5,000 m3 per day. That would allow us to serve an average of 1,000 homes per day. In five years, we would grow this delivery to capacity to 50,000 m3 per day in Nairobi, reducing the clean water supply shortfall faced by the municipal system by more than 20%.

We also want to build out our partnership with a handful of tank manufacturers who can help to simplify the logistics of acquiring and installing smart tanks.

The biggest barrier that we face at the moment is securing seed funding to offset capital investments. Additionally,  we are working through the following set of challenges:

• Ensuring sufficient operating buffer to offset unplanned disruptions. For example, all shared rides in Kenya are on strike at this time. Shared rides help us to manage transportation costs as we meet with customers or schedule visits to check on sensors that have stopped sending data for a range of reasons. As the strike continues our budget for this portion of spend will double.
• Simplifying the maintenance requirements for the growing number of sensors in our inventory
• Streamlining payments around the water delivery service.

• Securing the appropriate set of agreements that allow us to utilize untapped harvesting or other storage capacity.

To overcome the barriers we face, the following actions are planned:

• Exploring a range of options for funding, growing SMAJI ENTERPRISE sales and managing our head count
• The monitoring and tracking of sensors is increasing being automated and we are working with a range of vendors to get to more reliable versions of their products.

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Five total - three are full time staff and two work part time.

SMAJI's founders are ex-IBM researchers who have lived in Kenya for several years working as water domain experts and as hardware and software development leaders.  Dr. Kala Fleming,  who leads the team, is an environmental engineer by training with a track record of thought leadership on technology-driven water management across East/West Africa, South East Asia and the Caribbean. She has also consistently demonstrated the ability to attract and grow talent in emerging markets, nurturing them to outperform the expectations of their resource constrained environments.  

Our mostly Kenyan team is deeply embedded in the local ecosystem where SMAJI is being launched and bring a range of socioeconomic experiences. We serve and engage a diverse set of individuals - from those who live in informal settlements to those who live in planned low and middle income neighborhoods. Our team’s collective experiences connect to those realities on every level. We also have a wide reach across the broader Kenyan economy through our combined networks.  

The idea for SMAJI began more than five years ago, when many in the market were just waking up to the idea that water level sensing might have a role to play in improving water management. Now that we have found a creative business model that connects the need for greater monitoring and transparency with improving service delivery, we are poised to transform a fragmented ecosystem into a more connected whole that will improve the lives of millions.

• We have partnerships with German and French water level sensor providers and locally we are building a partnership with one of the major water tank suppliers.
• Oxfam and the City of Nairobi are among our first clients supporting the piloting of the solution.

SMAJI generates revenue through three streams:

1. Monitoring & Advisory/ SMAJI ENTERPRISE: Customers include Water Utilities, Schools, “water challenged” private business entities (such as apartments, hospitals, sports clubs and other businesses) and Water Truck Business Owners.  This services also allows us to reach the informal settlements via kiosks supported by community groups and NGOs.
   
2. Water Delivery/ SMAJI HOME:  Primary customers are homeowners and apartment dwellers.
3. Clean Water Sales:  Sales are made to mobile delivery vendors or directly to homeowners.

What is your path to financial sustainability?  

• SMAJI makes money via monthly subscription fees for SMAJI ENTERPRISE and SMAJI HOME and from clean water sales. We have established proof points around our projected revenue streams. SMAJI ENTERPRISE sales are underway and SMAJI HOME pilots have started.
• We are seeking grant investments to boost our efforts in Nairobi and to offset costs of sensors and clean water hubs.
• Longer term, we will seek capital investments to scale our efforts beyond Kenya.

SMAJI has the potential to transform i) how donors and investors think about the value of decentralized water management in Africa, ii) the use of granular, real-time data to really understand water equity iii) the drivers that influence waterborne contamination and the demand for clean water and iv) the use of tech-driven subscription business models for water.

Growing our thought leadership is just as important as (or even more important than) growing our sales. We need partners who can support our efforts across a complex and dynamic ecosystem. We see inclusion in the Solve network as an important first step toward building our momentum and growing our influence.

The opportunity to pitch at the UN General Assembly immediately connects us to NGOs and government leaders who have responsibilities around improving water service delivery and demonstrating progress on the SDGs. This would be an important milestone for accelerating our visibility, growth and impact.

We seek academic partnerships that will enhance the range of field studies we are able to undertake and the extent to which we can integrate the use of AI to extract value from the ever increasing amount of data that we are beginning to amass.  

Of course we also hope to attract investments through Solve’s network.   

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Academic institutions are of great interest to accelerate the extent to which we can integrate AI algorithms to extract value from the ever increasing amount of data that we are collecting.

We are also interested in partnering with WASH/water focused NGOs and others working to improve urban water systems as well as hospitals and schools in Africa. These partnerships would accelerate the use of continuous monitoring as the standard approach to ensuring reliable water supplies even in resource constrained environments.

Ensuring clean water is a prerequisite for any thriving community. With SMAJI, we are meeting people where they are with their current water supply conditions and providing a path to gradually improve water availability and quality.

AI enhances the value we can extract from the data being collected and improves our wherewithal to deliver timely services across three critical areas: i) forecasting water supply from the piped system ii) estimating water demands across water segments and iii) forecasting water quality across groundwater and rainwater supplies.

The ability to forecast when water from the piped system will next be available allows us to determine when/if water deliveries from secondary sources will be required and at what volumes, supporting both business and community-level planning.  From a business perspective, water supply forecasts for the primary system helps us to anticipate the need for water deliveries, and likely revenues from SMAJI HOME customers.  From a community level perspective, the estimates facilitate risk planning given likely consumer behaviors when shortages occur.

AI will improve how we monitor sensor accuracy and estimate water demands. We convert water level data to volumes using a range of techniques. Using the 90 to 144 data points collected per tank per day, we provide tank owners with an ongoing assessment of current volumes of water stored, volume of water recently delivered so that they can determine their next best set of planning actions.

We use emerging technologies to improve how water services are delivered. For impact, much more than a technology installation is required. We work to strengthen community groups and related social institutions so that they are empowered to lead the new ways of working with and benefiting from technology driven systems.  

Implementation of SMAJI means new smart water tanks are created along with increased expectations for more reliable supplies.  In Nairobi, we are working with Oxfam and a women-led community group to use smart tanks to improve water availability at kiosks in an informal settlement. The group first identified that they needed this assistance.  With improved monitoring in place, the group has been able to demonstrate improved water availability to community members.  In the cases where data is available but an improved response has been slow, the group is able to hold the water utility to account. As a next step, the management of the kiosks must evolve to be more business focused so that the need for Oxfam’s financial and political support in ensuring a sustainable water supply can be reduced.    

If selected, funding would enable i) scaling the number of kiosks being monitored ii) monitoring water quality and iii) revamping the business model used to maintain the kiosks.  The  business model revamp includes reducing the cost of water sold to the kiosk owner, improving the security of the token system used to generate revenues and improving the process for appointing kiosk managers.

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Roughly 50% of the population in the informal settlement where our work is centered is comprised of women. Our partnership with Oxfam in this location was initiated based on the requests of a women-led community group. They identified reliable access to clean water as their top priority and the key thing needed to improve their quality of life.  

SMAJI has enabled smart tank implementation at water kiosks and has improved how well the kiosks are monitored and managed.  With improved monitoring in place, the community group has been able to demonstrate improved water availability to community members.  In the cases where smart tank data is available but an improved water delivery response is yet to be realized, the group is able to hold the water utility to account.

If selected for this prize, funding would enable i) scaling the number of kiosks being monitored ii) monitoring water quality and iii) revamping the business model used to maintain the kiosks.  The  business model revamp includes reducing the cost of water sold to the kiosk owner, improving the security of the token system used to generate revenues and improving the process for appointing kiosk managers.

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SMAJI's co-founders are both women and roughly 50% of the population in the informal settlement where our work is centered is comprised of women. Our partnership with Oxfam in this location was initiated based on the requests of a women-led community group. They identified reliable access to clean water as their top priority and the key thing needed to improve their quality of life.  

SMAJI has enabled smart tank implementation at water kiosks and has improved how well the kiosks are monitored and managed.  With improved monitoring in place, the community group has been able to demonstrate improved water availability to community members.  In the cases where smart tank data is available but an improved water delivery response is yet to be realized, the group is able to hold the water utility to account.

If selected for this prize, funding would enable i) scaling the number of kiosks being monitored ii) monitoring water quality and iii) revamping the business model used to maintain the kiosks.  The  business model revamp includes reducing the cost of water sold to the kiosk owner, improving the security of the token system used to generate revenues and improving the process for appointing kiosk managers.