From Liverpool to South Africa: Local SME wins Innovate UK grant to support clean water tech in South Africa.
Hexsor Scientific Limited is a local technology SME with a global green outlook.
Part of the city’s Knowledge Quarter community, staff at the University of Liverpool spin-out company have been working hard over the last two years to grow the start-up business and seek out new opportunities for its smart IoT sensor technologies both in LCR and further afield.
This hard work has now borne fruit, as Hexsor has been awarded funding from Innovate UK, the UK’s innovation agency, and South Africa’s Technology Innovation Agency (TIA) to support the delivery of clean, safe water to low-income communities in South Africa, as part of the Scaling Out for Impact (SOFI) initiative.
The programme has been designed to help innovative UK-based SMEs and South African organisations to co-create solutions which address some of the critical challenges facing South Africa’s most at-risk communities.
Lead partner, and Liverpool Science Park customer, Hexsor Scientific is going to be joining forces with a consortium of UK companies and South African organisations to deliver an innovative toolkit solution to drive uptake of smart technologies within the South African water sector, and to support the next generation of South African entrepreneurs.
Co-Founder and CEO, Dr Jeyan Sreekumar, explained:
“We’re a small company, but we have some big ideas about sustainable regional growth and global impact.
“With support from organisations across Liverpool City Region, our work over the past couple of years has really prioritised the Tech for Good ethos, developing opportunities to build resilience into a wide range of companies across different sectors, while supporting the UN Sustainable Development Goals.”
The whole team has worked exceptionally hard to put this project together, and it offers a fantastic opportunity for Hexsor and their project partners to make a real impact in South Africa.
As the lead UK partner, Hexsor are going to provide a technological solution that removes many of the health and economic risks associated with the use of dirty water and, at the same time, put in place training and support to help local innovators in the water value chain to make their ideas a reality.
Dr Jeyan Sreekumar added:
“The entire Hexsor team is extremely excited to see what we can achieve, and how we can bring those benefits back into the region.”
To find out more about Hexsor Scientific, visit: https://hexsorscientific.uk/
