My heartfelt thanks to all the InnoCentive solvers voting in both Rounds of the JP Morgan/Chase Giving contest.

It is because of your support that ASSET won $25,000 for being in the top 100 of the vote-getters.

However in Round II, we seriously fell short in the number of fans. The winning charity had a Facebook fan base of 295,000 of which 122,500 voted. Our goal is to increase our fan base to 300,000 for the next competition starting in November 2010 and ASSET needs your help to reach the goal.

Please become a fan of ASSET India Foundation by clicking on the link below and request your friends and family to do the same.

http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=188234189796&ref=ts#!/group.php?gid=357122095006&ref=ts

Thanks again and best wishes

Ray Umashankar
Executive Director
ASSET India Foundation

ASSET India is a noble non-profit organization who provides marginalized women and children in rural India access to the skills and knowledge needed to escape the sex trade. They hope to use the $1 million prize money to give 5,000 women and children access to literacy programs.  They will also produce wireless routers to enable access to their programs for those living in rural areas. The program is currently limited to 500 due to space and resource limitations so this prize would dramatically increase the program’s impact and enrollment.

We ask you to support ASSET India’s efforts by voting for them. As evidenced by film producer Pat Loewi’s video of students at the ASSET center Delhi, ASSET India’s programs do much to enable women and children to escape the sex trade environment by arming them with knowledge, self-confidence and purpose.

The voting link is: http://apps.facebook.com/chasecommunitygiving/charities/717045

Their target is 100,000 votes and we can help them reach their goal.

Thanks so much for your help!

ASSET India has won Round I of the $1 Million JP Morgan/Chase Giving Facebook voting contest, and they are now eligible for the Round II voting contest.  Voting starts at midnight January 15th and ends at midnight on January 22nd. The highest vote-getter receives the prize of $1 million. If ASSET India wins, they will use this money to give 5,000 women and children access to literacy programs.  They will also produce wireless routers to enable access for those in rural areas. The program is currently limited to 500 due to space and resource limitations so this prize would dramatically increase the program’s impact and enrollment.

InnoCentive is proud to be associated with such an organization, and we ask you to support ASSET India’s efforts by voting for them. Their literacy programs not only give women and children an opportunity to have a legitimate alternate livelihood by getting out of sex trade environment, but also give them knowledge, self-confidence and a purpose to better their lives, as captured so eloquently by documentary film producer Pat Loewi in this video of students at the ASSET center Delhi.

The voting link is: http://apps.facebook.com/chasecommunitygiving/charities/717045

Their target is 100,000 votes and we can help them reach their goal.

Thanks so much for your help!

I’ve been interested in both radios and solar power for many years. I remember sitting in front of my father’s antique RCA receiver as a child, listening to shortwave broadcasts from around the world as I wondered how the signals could travel such great distances. Similarly, I remember my parents explaining how the solar panels that Jimmy Carter had installed at the White House could make electricity from sunlight. Both seemed like magic to me at the time.

I studied Computer Science during college and spent a good deal of time studying the design and construction computer network protocols. I had the privilege of taking a networking course from Simon Lam, Ph.D., who has been involved in network research and development since the 1970s, and who piqued my interest in wireless networking in particular.

During college, I became an amateur radio operator, and began making contact with other radio operators around the world. I am currently working on a rather lengthy goal of making contact with every country in the world. I have built and tinkered with quite a few radios, antenna systems, and ancillary components over the years. Perhaps most relevant to this specific problem, I have studied the design, construction, and operation of amateur radio networks. Their purposes and components differ, but they are similar in many ways to the network called for in this problem. Also during college, I began using the Linux operating system, which I have since employed many times in embedded systems and specialized computers such as network routers.

Recently, I have integrated solar power into my amateur radio activities. I have constructed several solar powered stations which employ many of the same design principles that I applied to this problem. I had the benefit of already having built similar systems when I wrote the proposal for ASSET India. My goal is to eventually power my entire office via solar power.

The most difficult design aspects of the ASSET India challenge were related to the very specific network protocol requirements. Luckily, I was able to find the excellent M.I.T. “Roofnet Project”, which had already addressed those same problems and whose researchers had published quite a few papers on the subject.

Find out more about the ASSET India Challenge.

The Seeker organization for this Challenge, ASSET India was founded by Ray Umashankar two years ago, with his daughter Nita and his wife Sushila. In the two years since ASSET was founded, the organization has opened several training centers in urban areas in India, where 369 students have been enrolled. Plans for 2009 include two or three more training centers and 600 or more enrolled students. Now with the availability of wireless, solar powered routers, he can reach many more people, including those who live more remote rural areas.

In December, Umashankar was recognized with The Purpose Prize which celebrates and supports “outstanding individuals 60 or older who are producing significant social innovation and accomplishing work of great importance. ”

I recently caught up with Dean Umashankar, to get a status update on the implementation of the wireless router technology, as well as an update on the organization’s plans for the future.

Hello Dean Umashankar. It has been a few months since the solar powered router Challenge was solved – what has ASSET been up to in this time?

ASSET has been busy raising funds to pay for the hardware, student wages and faculty salary. The total budget is $42,000 and so far we have raised $8,000. The two prototypes for the router should be ready and tested by September 2009.

Our partner organizations are eagerly awaiting the deployment of the routers. Once the technology is deployed successfully, we will be able to open several centers in rural India. ASSET has had many requests for setting up centers in small rural towns.

How do you anticipate that this deployment will help expand the ASSET mission?

Our target population consists of children of sex workers and girls rescued from trafficking. Since these girls living in rural areas lack the confidence and skills to move to larger cities to find technology related employment, we had to find a way to take the work to them so that they do not have to relocate. Innocentive’s assistance in solving the technology problem is of great significance and we plan to share the solution with other NGOs ( Non Government Organizations) that can benefit from it.

One of the exciting possibilities is the setting up of a center in a village where a large number of girls rescued from trafficking live. These include girls who had been dedicated to temples and subsequently ended up in brothels.

Interestingly, the overall downturn in the economy has not affected entry level IT positions at all- in fact the numbers are expected grow dramatically in the next couple of years.

Do you have plans to post any more Challenges on InnoCentive’s marketplace?

Yes. I most certainly do. In fact the biggest challenge I face now is finding qualified English language teachers for our centers. I have to identify a technology solution to make the delivery of English language lessons non-teacher dependent.

Congratulations on your recent Purpose Prize – can you tell us a bit about that?

The Purpose Prize recognizes social entrepreneurs over the age of 60. There were 9 prizes of $10,000 each and more than 1,200 nominations. The process took nearly 10 months and I was one of only two selected for a project outside the U.S. The reception took place at the Stanford Graduate School of Business. This prize has given great exposure to ASSET’s work and increased our credibility enormously.

Thank you so much for your time.  We wish you well in the expansion of ASSET’s good works and look forward to your next Challenge with InnoCentive!Thank you.

Dean Umashankar was recently profiled in a major online Indian publication – you can read this inspiring piece here – ‘Success doesn’t require any special skill, except passion’