When we last met Sarah Evans and Kathryn Bergmann, they were in the early days of their startup, Far past, which has an app that aims to help communities in rural East Africa monitor systems, diagnose and fix problems before they get out of hand. They had officially launched their company about a year and a half earlier, in January 2020, but due to the pandemic, their plans had taken a little detour for a while.
Sarah Evans and Kathryn Bergman
More recently, they have deployed the app in 75 communities, mostly in rural Kenya and Tanzania, and are developing software to help NGOs efficiently adopt the technology. “We’ve identified a lot of problems that would otherwise have been much more expensive to fix,” says Evans. “And communities have a lot more ownership of their systems.”
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Maintenance and diagnostics
Evans and Bergmann originally came up with the idea for the app through their work with Well aware, an Austin-based nonprofit that builds water systems in East Africa. While the systems they had installed all still functioned, many in other communities failed to do so due to poor maintenance. With that in mind, they created an app that allowed communities to monitor systems, diagnose and fix problems on their own, with remote advice from the company, and started a business to sell it.
Community members have maintenance checklists that they send to Well Beyond via the app on a monthly or quarterly basis, depending on the type of water system they have. The app will let them know when it’s time to complete the checklist, even if they don’t think there are any issues. Then the company’s maintenance team remotely identifies potential problems.
There is also a diagnostic option, for times when communities encounter a problem between check-ins. The app offers steps to take, presented in a decision tree, that guide individuals through the process with photos and videos. “That also helps them gain more knowledge about their water systems,” says Evans. According to Evans, the app can help communities solve problems themselves about half the time. Otherwise, Well Beyond will step in and figure out how to address the problem.
Tututha, Kenya
Now Well Aware is using the app in communities where the nonprofit has installed systems. And they have already been able to identify and solve several problems.
Dennis Mutaki, Well Beyond(r) Project Officer and Community Member
Recently reviewing their elementary school maintenance checklist, community members in Tututha, Kenya, with a population of 1,000, noticed leaks from pipes and problems with one of the pumps. Once they reported that information through the app, Well Beyond remotely assisted them in troubleshooting and repairing the problem themselves, without having to wait for a technician to arrive to fix the problem.
As a result, they had the rainwater and UV filter system up and running again in less than two hours, significantly faster than the usual two weeks it takes to solve such a problem, Bergmann said.
Dashboard
Evans and Bergmann are also finalizing an administrative dashboard that other NGOs can use to monitor and resolve issues in real time with water systems they have installed, along with community member training and overall impact. They hope to start licensing the software to organizations in the summer.
The first users are NGOs they know well and can help with a beta test. Then they expand their reach to other organizations. According to Evans, there is a “healthy” pipeline of organizations interested in becoming customers.
