With water as fuel innovation, Hyd Gas is looking to radically change the LPG industry in India
“Hydgas is a cooktop that produces its own gas. It uses water
as fuel and uses electricity to convert it to hydrogen and oxygen and
uses that to cook food.
It produces gas as needed, so there is no storage of any gases in Hydgas, which makes it completely safe compared to LPG.
It can also be integrated with solar power,” says a proud Riswin M.H.,
Co-founder and head of operations at Reinwo Labs. Reinwo Labs is a 2014
startup, founded by a team of recent college graduates, focused on
discovering and creating clean energy solutions. Hydgas is their
flagship product. The name Reinwo Labs is a juxtaposition of the young
founding team’s outlook. It stands for ‘REINventing the World’ explains
Riswin.
In their second year in college, the present founders of Reinwo Labs
were tinkering around making small websites and Android apps. Today they
are poised to bring about a massive, and much needed, change with their
potentially revolutionary product Hyd Gas- which splits regular tap
water into hydrogen and oxygen, which can then be burned to cook food in
hotels and homes. “It’s a clean, cheap and safer alternative to LPG and
all other types of cooking,”
Hyd Gas’s invention is a classic example of the power of sheer
chance. In their third year of college, dissatisfied with their digital
tinkering and yearning to make an impact but unsure of what to do, the
team came together to participate in an inter collegiate racing
competition. Each team had to build a car to race in the famous Buddh
circuit. While researching on how to develop a decent battery for their
car, they discovered hydrogen to be a consistent by-product throughout
all their experiments. Then they started research on renewable energy
centred on this epiphany.
Gas distribution in India is notoriously monopolized by the
government and a few handpicked agencies. Not only do urban customers
suffer abominably when it comes to availability and affordability, there
is deplorable rural penetration of the same. The consequences are at
best incredible inconvenience and at worst disastrous kitchen accidents
when people try to substitute homemade flames due to the lack of
cylinders. This was the core concern behind manufacturing a product like
Hyd Gas. “In India, the gas distribution is centralized in hands of big
companies.
We are trying to make it as de-centralized as possible,” Riswin shares.
Hyd Gas
The USP of the product, which the team is banking on to market, is
the zero risk involved. “Since it uses only water as fuel, the
pollution is practically 0%. The by-product of burning hydrogen is just
water. And there is no gas storage which makes it completely safe,” he
continues, “
It’s cooking made free and clean.”
Reinwo Labs is targeting two kinds of consumers for Hyd Gas. Riswin
says, “Firstly, the restaurants and hotels. An ordinary hotel uses an
average of 3-4 LPG cylinders a day. We hope that with this rate of
consumption they will find Hyd Gas to be a lucrative substitute. Our
second potential customers are home consumers – the LPG market of home
customers is really high and they are our primary market.
Initially the product will be sold only to hotels. More R&D has to be put on to the home version of the product.”
The path to developing a fully functioning product has been strewn
with difficulties. The relative inexperience of the team was a
considerable deterrent initially. As was the fact that Hyd Gas is the
first product of its kind, without any kind of precedent to guide its
growth. “
As it is a one of a kind product, we had limited references for developing it.
Also we are trying to reduce the price before we start selling to
households,” he continues, “Technical challenges were high during the
early stages of development, but now those have been addressed. We are
now faced with challenges are in fields like marketing and innovation.”
Though they have only one client at present- the cafeteria of CUSAT
(where four of the five team members have studied) – Riswin is pleased
with the market response they have received thus far. “The market is
responding quite well. We have already made deals with some hotel
corporates and a handful of restaurants for making them as our initial
customers. A number of NGO’s have expressed avid interest in Hyd Gas as
well,” he lists.
For the first two months of its inception, Reinwo Labs was
self-funded. Things started looking up soon after. “Then we got some
initial funding from Kerala State Electricity Board(KSEB) and Startup
Village. Final talking with the investors are currently ongoing for the
next stage of funding,” shares Riswin.
According to Riswin, though the hardest part about becoming an
entrepreneur is the responsibility- “The hardest part of it all is
making decisions, from the smallest to the biggest. As we were new to
everything including technology, we faced lots of problems in every
aspect”- he doesn’t think the team has had to make any sacrifices. “
About sacrifices, we love what we do, so there are none,” he winks.
The whole team- Vimal Gopal, Vijeesh TV, Nithin Mohan, Praveen
Sridhar and of course Riswin- love being an entrepreneur because, “
We work for ourselves. We can do whatever we think.”
Someday soon they plan to change the world. For now, “We need to find a
way to balance the needs of customers as well as grow the company in a
smart way,” smiles Riswin.
