Interview with Abhit.K, Social Hardware
●
Please tell us about Social Hardware and what motivate you to
work to address this area through products/services?
Social
Hardware works with organisations to provide assistive devices and
rehabilitation services to underserved communities in India & APAC regions.
On an average 23,500 Indian citizen
suffer upper limb amputation every year adding to the existing growing number
of 3 million arm amputees on average across the globe.
Increasing geriatric
population with a high prevalence of chronic diseases, rising accidental
incidences amongst developing communities is another ascending problem.
Even though almost 70% of India’s population lives in rural areas, where
the highest rate of amputation occurs, the prosthetics available does not focus
on hygiene, durability, distribution and cost-effectiveness. To counter these
problems, Social Hardware was originated.
● Please tell us about your incubator experiences and R&D involved in products/services Social Hardware is offering?
For
the first year of the project, we were entirely self-funded and bootstrapped
our way to constructing a proof-of-concept prototype with the help of a 3D
printing company in Bengaluru. After the proof-of-concept prototype was
completed, we applied for incubation at iCreate International Centre for
Entrepreneurship and Technology in Gujarat, which provided us with the support
and investment needed to set up Social Hardware International Pvt. Ltd. and
start hiring full-time designers in-house. We’re also exploring additional
grant and funding opportunities to expand our current operations.
●
How has the journey been so far? How are your products enabling
smooth living for people with disabilities?
Our goal is to develop
high-performance durable products designed to be affordable and sustainable in
tough working and living conditions using concepts of the generative study,
soft-robotics, miniature sensors. Our products are designed using Autodesk
Fusion 360 3D CAD software, which has made it incredibly easy to prepare the
product for prototyping and design for manufacturing.
We work in collaboration
with the centres to provide a four-stage rehabilitation package, which involves
various rehabilitation procedures, co-design workshops with the users to
involve them in our development process.
Currently, we have three product
verticals Avocado Wrist Connector, SH_Object holder, Electric powered UL
prosthesis.
We currently have
two products available for the market.
SH_Object holder is an upgraded version of "universal cuff", made
from a proprietary flexible material. The product offers durability,
flexibility, easy-to-fit features amongst others, holding the potential to
change the lives of people suffering from cerebral palsy, transmetacarpal
amputation and other hand mobility-related sufferings.
The avocado wrist connector is a lightweight prosthetic wrist which can be
connected to any adult prosthesis socket, it’s an AI-design based mechanical
adaptor allows connecting any agro-construction based tool that is used in the
field. The goal with the Avocado wrist connector is to bring back the
livelihood of the amputees belonging from the worker-class.
●
How do you see opportunities for Disabled in the country and
what measures can be taken to enhance sustainable careers?
It is
great to notice differently-abled people being involved in so many
multi-national companies, there is still a huge potential where more people can
be enrolled into a different level of programs, there are already designated
seats for enrollment however seeing the ascend in cases of disability the
requirement is more than before.
More of differently-abled people are starting their own venture which is very
promising as this will motivate others to do something go and better than the
rest of the population.
●
What role do you think is getmeenabled.com
online store playing in the space of accessibility.
In this day and age, we require an
e-commerce platform like getmeenabled.com as it allows the makers, companies
working across the globe in the assistive device space to be connected with
organisations, individual users around the world looking for different
assistive devices.
This not only makes the world a small place for makers and users but provide
quick access to products and a positive assistive device ecosystem. The
platform brings the commercial and social impact space together which is
required in our social entrepreneurship ecosystem.