Greenway Grameen Infra (GGI), a team of student entrepreneurs from India, has won the 8th annual Intel Global Challenge held at UC Berkeley.
Basically, the Intel Global Challenge (IGC) is a global business plan competition that encourages students to tackle some of the world’s most pressing issues.
GGI, the winners of the contest, have built an efficient cooking stove specifically for Indians, many of which still prepare their meals on open fires. Its product is essentially a biomass-based cylindric stove with a special air-flow generator that allows to save fuel and reduce smoke.
According to the startup’s team, usage of open cooking fires leads to more than 2 million premature deaths worldwide annually.
Greenway Grameen Infra is preparing two new models to launch in 2013, RIA Novosti reports. Since it commercially launched in December 2011, Greenway Grameen Infra has sold more than 12,000 units.
The startup has received $50,000 from Intel.
Three IGC special prizes of $15,000 were given to Nanoly (US), SAS (Colombia), and Avetics (Singapore).
About 30 teams participated in the contest this year, from which eight were chosen for the finals.
Image credit: Chef Cooke / Flickr
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