Seoul 25 Aug : Samsung Electronics said on Thursday that it has successfully concluded a collaboration with the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation to design a toilet prototype for the world’s most disadvantaged communities.Samsung announced that it will offer licenses of patents related to the technology to countries in need in the commercialisation phase without paying royalty payments.
The South Korean tech giant held an end-of-year ceremony at Samsung Advanced Institute of Technology (SAIT) which is its research and development branch, in Suwon, south of Seoul in connection with the Reinvent the Toilet (RT) project it was a participant in over the past three years, at the request of the foundation.
SAIT recently completed the development of key technologies for toilets and created a prototype that can be used in households SAIT announced the news it added that the toilet is “energy-efficient with effluent treatment capability,” reports Yonhap news agency.
The RT Challenge started in 2011 by the Water, Sanitation & Hygiene program of the Gates foundation to “generate innovative solutions that help communities and people stay safe from pathogens caused by human waste and allow governments to provide an inclusive sanitation service that can are accessible to the most vulnerable populations,” according to their website.
Samsung Electronics Vice Chairman Lee Jae-yong shared project results with Bill Gates when Gates visited Seoul last month according to Samsung.
The meeting was attended by Lee pledged to keep using Samsung’s technology to “help tackle the challenges that humanity faces,” the company said.
Samsung set up the task force for the project at SAIT in 2018 Lee has been actively involved and has shown a great enthusiasm in the work.
Lee as well as Gates have been in constant communication to keep one another up-to-date about the progress of the project, Samsung said.
Over 3.5 billion people in the globe live with poor sanitation and hygiene.These was the cause of more than half a million deaths due to diarrhea in 2016 according to the foundation.
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