Wheels Global Foundation areas of impact. / Courtesy Photo

WHEELS Global Foundation was created in response to the late President Abdul Kalam's call during the 2006 Pan IIT Convention Address, seeking technologies to solve rural India's problems.

Simultaneously, the desire of many successful US-based technology entrepreneurs lead to the incorporation of an organization with a purpose to 'give back.' Today, WHEELS is the go-to giving-back platform for Pan-IIT alumni, with the mission to transform 20 percent of Rurban India by 2030. It does so by harnessing the full potential of the technology heritage and the massive ecosystem of the highly regarded IIT system and its well-resourced alumni community and aligned professionals.

The IIT ecosystem includes 23 IITs, their faculty and students, over 500,000 alumni and leading enterprises across private, public, and government sectors. This approach is uniquely differentiated by its scale and scope, enabling collaboration across multiple IITs on a single opportunity and leveraging a global network of alumni from various IITs to address complex societal issues.

WGF strives to offer technology-enabled solutions to the six major challenges faced by people all over the world: clean drinking Water, scalable Healthcare delivery, renewable Energy, access to Education, rural Livelihood, and Sustainability. WHEELS acts as an impact enabler to scale up existing promising social-impact models with scaling runway of 5m-50m. Its goal is to work collaboratively with NGOs with feet-on-the-ground to become their technology and business partners and help them scale their promising solutions with huge growth and impact.

Its focus is on addressing gaps and acting as a key catalyst for accelerating the journey to a sustainable world. It also works with IITs to sponsor research and development if new solutions need to be developed. It leverages the power of an extensive alumni ecosystem, encompassing products and services, technologies and innovations, and business and financial models, all accessible to alumni working in early-stage start-ups to Global 1000 corporations.

WHEELS management consists of a leadership team of some of the most accomplished alumni of all IITs who are dedicating their time and resources to drive a number of high-impact initiatives in different parts of the country. All leaders not only work as pro-bono volunteers, but also provide financial contributions. All officers are volunteers who receive no compensation for their services and actively contribute to the causes. Impressively, over 95 percent  of donor contributions are directed towards the identified cause.

WHEELS enables scaling through its diversified initiatives that provide opportunities for alumni to give back to their communities, both geographically and within their specific domains of interest. With a portfolio of high-impact projects having rapid national-scale potential to impact millions, WHEELS has the participation and partnerships of dozens of recognized and well-known public, private and non-profit institutions.

These initiatives enable alumni to connect with purpose, satisfying their yearning for both networking and maintaining their connection to IIT. Ultimately, they offer a way for alumni to leave a meaningful legacy in their hometowns.

Currently, direct scaling support is provided to about 20 initiatives through WHEELS across its six domains. WHEELS is elevating its transformational value to three primary stakeholders: alumni, the IIT system, and the country through a new strategic initiative ‘Impact Collaboration Platform’. This platform is designed to facilitate cooperative efforts among various stakeholders (such as businesses, non-profits, governments, and individuals) enabling them to connect, communicate and collaborate more effectively. The platform enables orchestration of replication of onboarded solutions, and facilitates the development-to-deployment pathway for the IIT system, creating a massive multiplier effect on proven solutions and far better ROI on R&D.éz

WHEELS have rapidly built portfolio of compelling diverse solutions that have shown promising results, have 100+ field partners, and have a scalable impact on millions. The WHEELS ecosystem of contributing communities has steadily grown beyond Pan-IIT alumni to include several other professional groups like physicians, lawyers, administrators, and engineers from other engineering colleges, enriching the diversity of talent and solutions WHEELS can help accelerate. WHEELS welcomes corporate leaders, CSR associations, IAS officers, NGO partners, and various other professionals to achieve its mission.

We urge all of you with an interest in supporting WHEELS' efforts to visit the WHEELS website at www.wheelsglobal.org and explore the 'Get Involved' section, which provides numerous ways for you to be part of the WHEELS journey.

 

The Author is Marketing and Communications Manager, WHEELS Global Foundation.

(The views and opinions expressed in this article are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of New India Abroad)