Ethos Water, a powerful brand connecting consumers to a story and helping consumer contribute. Fantastic!
Recently P&G India launched their Shiksha program to help educate children. From their press release
Shiksha is P&G’s corporate social responsibility programme in which all the consumers can help educate underprivileged children by simply buying any of the P&G’s product
Vaatsalya Healthcare, a pioneer in semi-urban and rural healthcare in India, announces funding from Oasis Fund and Seedfund to expand hospital network across India.
Bangalore May 8th 2009. Vaatsalya Healthcare, a pioneer in semi-urban and rural healthcare in India, announces funding from Oasis Fund and Seedfund to expand hospital network across India. The investment was led by Oasis Fund, a Luxemburg based investment fund with a successful track record of investing in emerging enterprises across the world. Vaatsalya is expanding the Vaatsalya Hospitals network from seven hospitals in Karnataka to twenty hospitals across India. Existing investor, Seedfund also participated in this round of funding.
Jean-Philippe de Schrevel and Eric Berkowitz, from the investment advisory firm Bamboo Finance, stage funding from India’s leading early stage fund Seedfund and India’s leading micro venture capital fund, Aavishkaar.
Indian metros and urban areas have access to some of the world’s best healthcare facilities, whereas the semi-urban and rural areas often do not have access to basic healthcare services. Vaatsalya aims to plug this gap and provide basic and secondary care in the areas where such services or quality services do not exist. Vaatsalya’s goal is to be the leading low-cost but high quality service provider in its geographies of operations.
Today, Vaatsalya provides affordable primary and secondary healthcare services across seven districts in Karnataka and is currently managing 300 beds, making it the largest chain of its kind. With the new round financing Vaatsalya aims operate 20 hospitals across southern region.
Recepient of the Sankalp Award 2009 for Healthcare Inclusion, Winner of the BiD challenge India 2007 and LRAMP award 2008 in the enterprise category, Vaatsalya focuses on the core specialities of Gynaecology, Paediatrics, General Surgery and General Medicine at each of its hospitals. In addition, depending on the unmet needs of the local community specialised services like Dialysis, Intensive Care Units, Paediatric Surgery, Diabetology and Neurosurgery are added to the service portfolio.
Dr Ashwin Naik, Founder and Vaatsalya CEO said “Our goal is to revolutionise the existing healthcare system in India by focusing primarily on providing high quality healthcare services to semi-urban and rural India. We are fortunate to have found partners like Oasis and Seedfund who share our passion and vision.”
“Our hospital network is proud to have attracted the best medical teams from across India, who have shown a keen desire and passion to work in our hospitals, particularly doctors who were born and grew up in semi-urban India. Our strategy is to tap into the entrepreneurial spirit of such doctors and work with them on expanding our network. Over the next two years, in addition to our Greenfield projects, we will be actively exploring options to partner with existing nursing homes and hospitals that share our philosophy.” added COO and co-founder Dr Veerendra Hiremath.
Jean-Philippe de Schrevel said: “Oasis Fund and its advisory company Bamboo Finance are very proud to be partnering with Vaatsalya to increase healthcare access in India. We created Oasis to support commercially viable social ventures and build on the success we had with BlueOrchard in the area of microfinance. We are working with Vaatsalya on a strategy to increase its outreach to low-income patients by providing a link with microfinance institutions and micro health insurance programs. “
“We have looked all over the world and Vaatsalya has one of the most innovative business models for providing healthcare access in middle and low income communities. Vaatsalya has proven that they can provide affordable and high quality healthcare in a sustainable and scalable way. This makes Vaatsalya a perfect fit with the mission of Oasis and we are excited to support the expansion of their hospital network and their service to low income communities.” added Eric Berkowitz.
Bharati Jacob from Seedfund added “We are proud to be associated with Vaatsalya as its model has shown that low cost doesn’t necessarily mean low quality and that scalable and profitable business model can be built while providing lower priced health care services. We believe Vaatsalya will revolutionise low cost delivery model”
About Oasis Fund and Bamboo Finance:
Oasis Fund is a Luxembourg SICAV-SIF which invests in innovative, commercially viable enterprises which are designed to generate significant social impact and solid financial return. Bamboo Finance is the Geneva based advisory firm for Oasis.
About Seedfund:
Seedfund, an early stage venture capital fund looks to invest in media, mobile, internet, retail and consumer-facing businesses. Seedfund is founded by Pravin Gandhi, Bharati Jacob and Mahesh Murthy. Seedfund’s investors include Google, Reliance ADA Group, Motorola, Sierra Ventures and Mayfield. Seedfund has made investments in around 10 companies including Vaatsalya, Agencyfaqs.com, RedBus.in and CarWale.
About Aavishkaar:
The Aavishkaar India Micro Venture Capital Fund (“Aavishkaar”, http://www.aavishkaar.org) is a World Business Award winning venture fund founded on the principle that sustainable development can be achieved by encouraging and investing into micro and small enterprises, with a value proposition targeting the Base of the Pyramid. Aavishkaar’s focus is into sectors such as agri-business, renewable energy, healthcare, handicrafts, technology interventions improving accessibility and other such areas that impact the larger society.
Contact Information:
Vaatsalya Healthcare
Mr. Rocky Philip
Email: admin@vaatsalya.com
Tel: +91 80 41104652
Web: http://www.vaatsalya.com
Seedfund
Ms Bharati Jacob
Email: info@seedfund.in
Tel: +91 22 24902201
Web: http://www.seedfund.in
Bamboo Finance
Mr. Eric Berkowitz
Email: info@bamboofinance.com
Tel: +41 22 596 4750
Web: http://www.bamboofinance.com
Aavishkaar
Mr. P Pradeep
Email: info@aavishkaar.org
Tel: +91-22-32535292
Web: http://www.aavishkaar.org
Daily dump is one of those organisations that you hear of and want to sign up immediately! Its a simple idea, executed well, packaged nicely and a great support online!
From their website:
Daily Dump offers a range of products and services that help compost at home.
It also provides solutions and knowledge through an open source platform.We suggest you begin with the troubleshooting / common mistakes / what can go in pages
to get a quick overview of the process.Today (April 2009) our customers keep 3130 kgs of organic waste out of landfills
everyday by converting it into great nutritious manure for the earth, using our products.
An insurance scheme for 300 Million people who dont have access to good quality healthcare, where each family is entitled to more than 700 in-patient procedures with a cost of up to 30,000 rupees per annum for a nominal registration fee of 30 rupees.
The scheme provides the participating BPL household with choice between public and private hospitals and makes him a potential client worth attracting and keeping due to the significant revenues that hospitals stand to earn through the scheme. Uniquely, the scheme places control over significant resources in the hands of the beneficiary, empowering the BPL household and potentially creating an important source of competition for his business.
Second, and related to this point, the overall design of the scheme involves incentives that are conducive both to the expansion of the scheme as well as long run sustainability. In the case of enrolment, the insurer is compensated for each household enrolled and issued a smart card. Unlike other schemes, that operate as ?unnamed policies?, there is a direct link and ownership by the member who is required to attend the enrollment and pay thirty rupees in order to obtain benefits. In other schemes, government has paid the entire premium for all BPL workers without creating individual records of membership or any other direct link between the insurance program and those that are meant to benefit from it.
Hospitals have an incentive to attract the BPL households as a potentially huge source of revenues. This is true even for public hospitals which are now being allowed to create ?societies? which will allow them to retain a share of the revenues that they collect. Insurers, in contrast, have an incentive to monitor participating hospitals in order to avoid excessive claims through fraudulent or unnecessary procedures. The inclusion of intermediaries such as NGOs and MFIs which are ostensibly interested in assisting BPL households should help BPL households to understand how to utilize the services. Finally, the basic information gathered by government on a timely basis and reported publicly should allow both for mid-course improvements in the scheme as well as contribute to competition during subsequent tender processes with the insurers.
How great is that. Wait, there is more.
Each family gets a smart card! The smart card entitles its bearer to a list of pre-specified in-patient services in the second month following enrollment. So, for example, someone enrolled in the month of February can use the card at designated hospitals as of April 1st of the same year through March 31th of the following year. (Provisions exist for pro-rata premium payments to the insurance company in the event of partial year enrolment subject to a minimum of six months.) The smart cards are nominally paid for and belong to the GOI.
The transaction process begins when the member visits the participating hospital and his or her card is swiped. If a diagnosis leads to a procedure, the appropriate prescribed package is selected in the software menu. Upon release, the card is again swiped and the pre-specified cost of the procedure is deducted from the 30,000 rupee total on the card. A receipt is printed and provided to the member.
And this is a government program!
How does this work?
The majority of the financing, about 75 per cent, is provided by the Government of India (GOI), while the remainder is paid by the respective state government. State governments engage in a competitive bidding process and select a public or private insurance company licensed to provide health insurance by the Insurance Regulatory Development Authority (IRDA). The technical bids submitted must include a number of elements as per GOI requirements. The insurer must agree to cover the benefit package prescribed by GOI through a cashless facility that in turn requires the use of smart cards which must be issued to all members. This requires that a sub-contract be arranged with a qualified smart card provider. The insurer must also agree to engage intermediaries with local presence such as NGOs, MFIs, etc. in order to provide grassroots outreach and assist members in utilizing the services after enrolment. The insurer must also provide a list of empanelled hospitals that will participate in the cashless arrangement. These hospitals must meet certain basic minimum requirements (e.g., size and registration) and must agree to set up a special RSBY desk with smart card reader and trained staff. The list should include public and private hospitals.
The financial bid is essentially an annual premium per enrolled household. The insurer is compensated on the basis of the number of smart cards issued, ie., households covered. Each contract is specified on the basis of an individual district in a state and the insurer agrees to set up an office in each district where it operates. While more than one insurer can operate in a particular state, only one insurer can operate in a single district at any given point in time. The hardware and software specifications laid down by GOI imply inter-operability across districts and states.
The operation of the system involves three (Rashtriya Swasthya Bima Yojana) at RSBY or read the Wall street journal article
http://in.youtube.com/watch?v= 4BTfqfBgB4A
