Rural Technology & Business Incubator, IITM Creating Wealth in Rural India

Innovative Technologies to connect Rural India  All taluka headquarters are connected by fibre  Last mile technologies are rapidly emerging  Broadband CorDECT WiLL developed at IITM, India provides a telephone line and 256 kbps Internet connection in 25 Km radius Exchange and tower in town –Works at 55  C –Power requirement: 1 KW –start-up costs very low  Newer technologies emerging  Promising 1/2 Mbps connectivity with OFDM (like / WiMax) with HDR and HSDPA US$200 per line deployed Exchange and tower in town

Innovative Business Models  n-Logue / Drishtee / e-chaupal / CSC: Rural Service Providers  aggregate demand into a kiosk  owned & driven by a local entrepreneur  US$1200 per Kiosk providing telephone, Internet, multimedia PC with web-camera, printer and power back-up for PC plus Indian language software, video conferencing software, training and maintenance and 6 months unlimited Internet  set up by a village entrepreneur on the lines of urban PCOs Provides multiple services to break even Needs USD100 pm to break even

Rural Services – An Overview Capacity Building – Education – Health Income Generation – Agriculture – Entrepreneurship – Outsourcing Enabling Services –Finance –Markets (exchanges /trading) –e-Governance –Water Management –Energy –Communications and Transportation

Towards enabling Rural Areas…. Education 3- (Rating carried out on 0 to 5 scale to indicate where India is)

Education  Curriculum based  Passing SSLC: excellent results  Skill based  Spoken English  Computer Basics  CAD, Web development, Photoshop  Repair pumps, wire for electricity, carpentry  Concept based  Science and Business concepts

Towards enabling Rural Areas…. Rural BPO From London, Boston, NY To Bangalore, Mumbai and Delhi Then Jaipur, Mangalore, and Pune Is it the turn of Shikrapur, Modaj and Mettupalliyam? 2

Rural BPO Initiative  Rural BPO Services  Administrative  Data Entry  Data Conversion  Localization (English to regional languages)  Translation  Voice Over  Engineering  2D drafting  2D to 3D conversion

Towards enabling Rural Areas…. Rural Production As Chennai becomes the manufacturing hub for Nokia and BMW… Can Pinjavakkam become the production hub for Chennai? 1-1-

Building and Aggregating Distributed Rural Production Units as back end for industries Focus Sectors: Crafts, Leather, Garments, Agro Processing Rural Production Outsourcing

Towards enabling Rural Areas…. Healthcare 1+ Telemedicine:  Initial experiments with eye care and with Veterinary doctors using the video conferencing tool  Moved on to video-consulting for GP & gynecology problems Vet care with Veterinary college Remote Eye Care with Aravind Hospitals

ReMeDi™ Tele-medicine solution  Healthcare Delivery  Identification of village healthcare delivery centers  Linkage with a hospital partner via ReMeDi™ telemedicine solution  Supply and delivery of essential medicines Kiosk Operator Pharma Companie s ReMeDi™ Telemedicine Kit Local Partner Hosp RP RP – Rural Patients

Towards enabling Rural Areas…. Agriculture 1-

Managing Risks for farmers Crop disease: Use of video conferencing to connect farmer to an agricultural Expert  Obtaining answers before it is too late After Before In a Village in Madurai, the Lady’s Finger (Okra) crop was turning white The problem was sent to the experts at the Department of Rural Extension, Madurai Agricultural College and Research Centre who diagnosed it as “Yellow Mosaic disease”

Agriculture  Agro Processing  Agricultural Advisory Services  Agricultural Supply Chain Management  Focus: Fruits and Vegetables in Theni District of Tamil Nadu  Strategy: To link markets, banks, extension partners and suppliers to small farmers

Production and Price Risk Coverage  Rain-fall insurance  Micro-weather Measurement and prediction Collect weather data at each village –Temperature, humidity, pressure, wind speed, wind direction and rainfall Weather Monitoring Kit : USD300  Market risk: use of commodity exchanges forward pricing and Options  Can one get small farmers to use it?

Facilitate Sales and post-harvest support  Use of Village Internet kiosk and mobile phones for  Obtaining market-prices in different Markets  Transaction and deal-closing from villages  Scheduling delivery  Booking of transport  Direct payment through banks and loan repayment

Towards enabling Rural Areas…. Financial Services 1

Financing by banks from towns is expensive  Is Microfinance the answer  Has made great strides, but what is the interest rate? At 24 to 30% interest rate it is good loan for –Trading and Short term consumption loans –But not for any manufacturing / agriculture?  Can kiosks become mini-banks?  Internet banking: But how will cash be delivered?  Can kiosks carry out credit-rating of rural people?  What about Insurance?  Can they enable different kinds of insurance? Life Insurance, health insurance, General Insurance, rainfall insurance

We could put Internet in every village but for its cost?  TeNeT / VorTex develops ATM  Finger print detection  Internet kiosk based or Stand alone  Deliver even soiled notes Single denomination today Can be extended to multiple denomination  Electronic Lock operated using finger print detection  Cost about USD1500 for kiosk ATM Vortex GramaTeller initiative, reducing the cost of ATM to 1/15th

Towards Credit Rating

RURAL BUSINESS, TRANSPORTATION, ENERGY & OTHERS Towards enabling Rural India…. 0+

Rural Businesses  Agriculture, food processing & other small businesses  Can they be enabled by ICT kiosks?  Does technology play a significant role in supply chain management & co-ordination?  Can they be used for market linkages & pricing mechanisms?  Can kiosks be used to find jobs?

Decentralized Energy  Grid based Power Supply  Quality and availability Urban Power will take precedence Rural India will only get overflow  Each Village require 30 KW to 100 KW Power Generation  Solar  Biomass Combustion  Biogas  Bio-diesel  Can kiosk be used to enable this?

Summary  ICT kiosks can enable livelihoods  100,000 kiosks by Government  Success however is driven by applications  Can ICT provide access to the village and for the villager?  Services are change agents  Business models, however, need to be evolved Towards enabling Rural Areas….

RTBI-SBI Finance Projects Rural Banking Project NREGS Mobile front-end

Process Finalise agreements Common Channel- Kiosk Train Kiosk Operators Design questionnaire and products Set up Required infrastructure Steps Involved Identify implementation areas Set up kiosks Identify Business model Launch

Technical Framework- Rural Banking Core Banking Software LHO Front End Server (FES) Internet Audit log facility Kiosk PC FP Scanner RTBI Research Questionnaire SBI Services Research Data Internet Wireless Finger print database

Rural Banking- Stake holders Kiosk Owner RTBI Chetana Trust SBI N-logue Parties Involved Bio-metric device supplier TCS

Rural Banking Loans Deposits Rural Banking Questionnaire Text Banking Products Data is collected by RTBI by conducting an online survey. Loan Recovery Term Deposit Recurring Deposit Savings Bank Sahaj Farm Mechanisation Dairy Schemes Produce Marketing Loan Crop Loans under tie-up arrangement

Identify Business Model Kiosks of N-logue have been identified to act as the Business Correspondent of the Bank. Kiosk operator will be acting as the agent of the Bank and she will do the transactions on behalf of the customer(villager) 1 Rural Banking Project- Status Status of Agreements RTBI- Chetana- SBI agreement – Yet to be finalised.(Double taxation issues to be sorted out) Rules and Regulations for Business Correspondents as formulated by SBI to be furnished to RTBI. Nature and limitations on transactions to be discussed with SBI. Memorandum of Understanding between RTBI and N-logue to be finalised Chetana- RTBI- KO agreement to be finalised Identify Implementation areas 2 districts having a total of 50 villages have been chosen for the pilot phase of implementation- Mayiladuthurai District And Thirupathur District Set up Kiosks Existing 50 kiosks of N-logue have been used to launch the products. Sites to be visited and status of equipment is to be checked.

Design questionnaire and Products Questionnaire- RTBI has designed the questionnaire, developed the application and it is ready. SBI Products – Finalised list of products to be discussed with SBI.: Processes to be identified for technology implementation Set up Required Infrastructure Bio-metric device : Bio-metric device has been received and testing is being done by RTBI. Integration with Bio-metric application to be done. TCS: Status to be checked from TCS on the following: Changes to Core Banking Software to be effected Application for 9 products to be developed. Others: Training Module on Banking Products to be designed by RTBI and SBI. Training of Kiosk Operators Training to be provided to the Kiosk operators by N-logue on operations of kiosk Training to be provided to Kiosk operators on banking products by SBI and RTBI.

NREGS –Stake holders Kiosk Owner RTBI SBI NIC N-logue Parties Involved Vortex

Identify Business Model Flexgo Kiosks and Vortex ATMs will be used to implement the NREG Scheme The Kiosk Operator will enter the data required under the Scheme. 1 NREGS Project- Status Status of Agreements RTBI- SBI agreement yet to be finalised. (Rs.3500 per month by SBI to the kiosk under discussion.) RTBI-KO & RTBI-PO agreements are ready- Yet to be signed. General Licence has been obtained by SBI for ATM. SBI has obtained individual licence for 3 kiosks. Has to be re-applied for 2 kiosks.(Change of place) RTBI-N logue Memorandum of Understanding has been finalised Identify Implementation areas 5 villages in Cuddalore were identified and agreed upon. In 2 cases, the site had to be changed. Set up Kiosks In 2 villages, kiosks have been set-up. In the rest of the three sites, kiosks are yet to be set up. In all the 5 kiosks, printer and USB scanner have not been delivered

Design Product NIC Software has been developed and is ready for implementation. Some fine-tuning needs to be done in the Muster Roll Module Set up Required Infrastructure ATM : ATM Is being tested by FSS. SBI to test after that Once ATMS are ready, integration with SBI Banking Software to be done. Once Kiosks are ready, NIC software has to be installed by NIC, Cuddalore. Others: Training Module on NREGS to be designed. Training of Kiosk Operators Training to be provided to the Kiosk operators by N-logue on operations of kiosk. Training to be provided to Kiosk operators on NREGS.

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