Editions

Small is Beautiful The micro-everything revolution

Check out the diverse assortment of PopTech stage talks from presenters who address how the micro-everything revolution applies to insurance, energy, education, diagnostics, and more.

• Microsolar Paul Needham and Simpa Networks

  Paul Needham’s organization, Simpa Networks, makes solar energy available to the poor. By using a pay-as-you-go pricing structure modeled after mobile phone cards, Simpa gives its customers ownership of the electricity. Once the initial cost of the equipment is paid off, the device belongs to the customer and their electricity is free.

• Microdiagnostics Hayat Sindi and Diagnostics for All

  2009 PopTech Social Innovation Fellow Hayat Sindi co-founded Diagnostics For All to offer point-of-care diagnostic tools micro-fabricated in paper. These technologies allow healthcare workers to monitor the treatment of the 60% of people living beyond the reach of medical infrastructures. Sindi is also an advocate for science education and careers for women in the Middle East.

• Microdesign Krista Donaldson and D-Rev

  Krista Donaldson runs D-Rev: Design Revolution, which creates world class products—market and user driven—designed to meet the needs of the four billion people all over the world living on less than four dollars a day.

• Micromobile Nigel Waller and Movirtu

  2009 PopTech Social Innovation Fellow Nigel Waller launched Movirtu to provide virtual mobile phone services for people earning less than two dollars a day. As Movirtu expands across Africa and Asia, even the poorest individuals can send text messages and make mobile payments as well as find work and access healthcare.

• Microwater Sameer Kalwani and Sarvajal

  Health in India is compromised by dirty water. Sameer Kalwani’s Sarvajal enables access to clean water, enlisting local entrepreneurs to sell it and monitoring water quality remotely. Customers are happy to pay to get clean water at their doorstep. What started with 1 village 3 years ago now provides safe water to 70,000 people daily.

• Microhydro Salinee Tavaranan and BGET

  Social Innovation Fellow Salinee Tavaranan and the Border Green Energy Team are helping to bring light to some of the world’s darkest places. She and her team work on the border of her homeland, Thailand, and Burma, a country that’s been embroiled in civil war for over sixty years, to bring solar power to clinics and medical facilities that desperately need it.

• Microcomputing Derek Lomas and Playpower Foundation

  2009 PopTech Fellow Derek Lomas is director of the Playpower Foundation, a global network of developers, designers, academics, NGOs and businesses. Playpower leverages the availability of ultra-low-cost computers to create and distribute affordable, effective, and fun learning games for under-privileged children worldwide.

• Micromanufacture Adrian Bowyer and RepRap

  A machine that builds itself? Adrian Bowyer, leading researcher at the University of Bath, shows us that this seemingly fantastic idea is not far from becoming reality. The self-replicating rapid prototyper, or “RepRap,” could have dramatic effects on people in developing countries.

• Microinsurance Rose Goslinga and Kilimo Salama

  Traditional crop insurance relies on farms visits, a proposition which doesn’t add up for small farms. Kilimo Salama, run by Rose Goslinga, uses creative, low-cost methods, such as weather stations, to remotely determine whether drought conditions justify payout. Able to invest more at lower risk, Kenyan farmers are producing historic crop yields.