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PWX is the first social entrepreneurship project that requires changes at both ends of philanthropy:
the grantee/implementer end and the foundation/donor side.
Rajesh conceived PWX when given the task of overseeing the funding and managing of water projects for Blue Planet Run.
Rajesh immediately saw the problem of scale: how to ultimately deliver impact through thousands of small projects?
He designed PWX to solve the project selection, funding, and monitoring problem facing the foundation.
Rajesh got Sapient to develop the first release and has been building on that foundation for four years:
designing new features, continually enhancing the platform, developing the partner network, and running all activity on PWX.
His work as a management consultant to companies and non-profits on using internet and e-commerce
technologies to change culture, operating models, and market strategies helped in trying a new approach
to solve the scale problem in managing thousands of grassroots water projects.
His early career spanned 10 years at Bell Laboratories, experiencing all facets of product cycles.
After receiving his MBA, Rajesh became a management consultant at CSC Index and also had stints in three start-ups.
He moved to the NGO sector, starting by serving as CTO/CFO at The Natural Step and Redefining Progress.
Rajesh helped develop TNS' sustainability advisory services
and corporate footprints and global warming mitigation opportunities at RP.
Extremely interested in sustainability and social equity, Rajesh teaches and writes on various issues facing humanity,
and is now immersed in the world of water.
Rajesh did his undergraduate studies in engineering at the Indian Institute of Technology, Bombay and Lafayette College,
and received an MS and MBA from the University of California.
Ajaya was the lead architect of PWX at Sapient and now is the software guru of PWX. He is very interested in technology and constantly pushes PWX into Web 2.0 space. Other tech experiences for Ajaya include Cisco, APL, and Capital One.
Being raised in Orissa, India, Ajaya is very interested in water issues and solving problems in a big, scalable, results-oriented way.
It is the decentralized network model that allows PWX to operate so efficiently! The PWX network is the Team! Volunteers do make all the difference and we have been lucky.
After nearly three years as a PWX staff member, Annette is working in West Africa,
but still offers her free-time to PWX.
Fluent in French and Spanish, and of course, English, Annette worked with PWX partners helping
with their online interactions.
She also helped with the testing of the PWX platform, as well as with BPRF work.
During a year in Ghana at an orphanage and a Liberian refugee camp,
Annette began to work on water and sanitation issues.
She has multiple experiences in the nonprofit sector, including case management and
coordinating volunteers for a tutoring agency, researching carbon laws for an environmental lawsuit,
translating for a dam prevention campaign, and fundraising for several non-profits.
After 35 years in the software industry in USA, Larrie finds himself in Bangalore,
dabbling with virtual systems in an attempt to create an open source environment to manage software projects.
He is happy to work with PWX analyzing the impacts of their rapidly growing database,
and with requirements on business intelligence modules.
Larrie has worked both in small company situations, as well as large ones such as ConAgra, John Deere, and Cenex/Land O'Lakes.
Larrie's last job was as an Application Development Manager at an HMO in the Twin Cities.
He was also a major player in the creation of MnHIE within Minnesota, where he was in the EA, Operations, and Privacy groups and chaired the Data group.
Interning with the Blue Planet Run Youth Board for two years,
Megan worked with talented and motivated young people to increase awareness about the water and sanitation crisis in the US and around the world.
After graduating from the University of Colorado with degrees in creative writing and French,
Megan is now spending a year traveling through the developing world, volunteering with PWX where possible,
to see first-hand the need and impact water and sanitation have on communities.
Megan plans to continue to study and work in international development after traveling by pursuing a masters degree in a related field.
Sophia started volunteering for PWX in Jan 2009 helping correlate and audit the different data streams in PWX.
She became extremely interested in water and sanitation issues after her experiences studying and interning in South Africa for 8 months.
She graduated in engineering with a concentration in environmental topics from Swarthmore College, Pennsylvania.
She is currently pursuing a Master's degree at the University of Cape Town, South Africa,focusing on urban water management issues;
where she hopes to take up the challenge of combining theory and practice.
Vallari was the senior manager at Sapient providing the strategic roadmap and oversight for the building of the initial release.
She continues to be involved refining the strategy and marketing pitches.
Vallari has been in the software development and client management world for over two decades.
Most recently as a director at Sapient, she sold and delivered large-scale IT projects, managing international teams.
She started her career in India by starting a company to serve small businesses with IT solutions.
Later, she moved to NY and worked at S&P before moving to California.
She also taught IT at inner city schools.
Other interests including dance, running a dance company, travel, and sustainability - especially in organics.
We were lucky to find a few good volunteers who made significant contributions to PWX.
In 2006 Alejo Lopez in 2006 helped with testing, marketing, and did the Spanish translations.
In 2009, Minakshi Arora of Water Community in New Delhi translated the Hindi pages
and Neil Parmeswar helped set up a process to get project data from partners into PWX.
We want to acknowledge three PWX members - El Porvenir (Carole Harper and Rob Bell), Kairos (Martin Strele), and Safer Future (Idriss Kamara) -
whose support helped drive the design and deployment of PWX at its beginning in 2005-06.
The idea of creating a run around the planet hit Jin in 2001 and he founded Blue Planet Run in 2002.
He realized that without solving the scale problem, increased funds for water were not going to be used effectively.
An industrialist, philanthropist, and environmentalist,
he has been a principal in a number of businesses, incluing scrap metal processing,
steel forging/fabrication, film and television production, fish farming, real estate
development, and software development and marketing. In 1991, Jin and his wife Linda,
established a donor advised philanthropic fund at the Marin Community Foundation that
focuses on environmental issues. Jin has served on the board and staff of numerous
nonprofits over the past 35 years including The Natural Step, the Predator Conservation
Alliance, and the Earth Trust Foundation. Since 1979, Jin has been affiliated with
Dia Rosatsu Zendo Kongo-Ji, a Zen Buddhist Monastery in upstate New York.
Mark helps with the visual and creative needs of PWX, when he finds spare time from his BPRF duties. He has spent 15 years in print and digital media, but considers himself a musician, artist, wilderness athlete, and entrepreneur.
Lisa helps bring a consumer focus to PWX and even participates in testing the platform. Lisa came to Blue Planet Run in early 2008, bringing 25+ years of senior consumer marketing roles with companies like American Express, Yahoo!, and Internet start-ups.
PWX has always received support from all BPR team-members, including former team-member Leyla Wefalle. Irina Balytsky, an intern in 2007, helped test and refine all the new features developed that year.
The Sapient team helped define and build PWX in record time and pro bono too!
The core team: Ajaya Agrawalla, Ruchika Chhotani, Ramit Dembi, Deepti Goel, Raymond Peng,
Kamar Rizwan, Vallari Shah, Srinath Sura, Elise Urbanek, and Pankaj Kumar Vijaywargiya.
Support from: Surya Chikkala, Saro Iskendarian, Jennifer Snow, Puneet Udasi, Matia Wagabaza, and Jason Welsh.
Thanks to their passion and dedication PWX was announced and demonstrated at the Mexico World Water Forum in 2006.
The team at S & T Group has been very supportive of PWX, especially Juliet D'Souza and Anita Joshi for logistics.
S & T Group started helping BPR in 2004 with the shooting of the movie - arranging for all the logistics in India.