Karunakara M Reddy

Karunakara M Reddy (born on 3, June 1975) is an entrepreneur, founder, chairman and managing director of Smaat India Private Limited, He did his Master of Business Administration (MBA-Marketing) in Marketing from Symbiosis Centre for Management Studies,Pune in 1994.
Career
He started his career as an entrepreneur, even while pursuing his bachelor's degree. During his college days, he, along with another associate, established ‘Sindhuja Enterprises’, a Television Units fixing company.

Pepsico
After completing his master's degree, he started his career as a sales manager in Pepsico India in year 1994. He sold Aquafina, the company's mineral water brand. In 1995, he became Customer Relations Manager in the same company and established a rapport with customers and devised sales strategies that helped the company improve its revenues. He was then elevated as merchandising executive. He achieved a regional sales growth of up to 368% in 1998.
Smaat India
In 1998, he founded Smaat Associates as a proprietary firm and began selling water purifiers. In 2001, Smaat Aqua Technologies began specializing in water, wastewater treatment and purification systems. The firm was eventually incorporated as a Private Limited Company, Smaat India Private Limited, and it began establishing Community Water Centers. The company has established more than 14,000 water, wastewater treatment, and purification plants in India and across the globe.
The company designs, manufactures and installs water treatment plants that use reverse osmosis, nanofiltration, and ultraviolet purification techniques.
In 2007, it implanted disinfection water treatment plants in one of the world's largest bird meat export company in Germany. The company got the ISO 9001:2008 certification for its quality. It has installed its first mobile seawater desalination treatment plant in Saudi Arabia in 2008.
In 2009, the company began its first mobile water treatment plant for flood and disaster management in West Bengal, India. In the same year, he won the BID Quality Crown Award for his Innovation in Aqua Technology, an international award for quality management.
In 2010, he constructed 1,500 rooftop rainwater harvesting structures in and around Andhra Pradesh, India. The company has installed more than 4,500 water treatment units which helped remove ions like fluoride, arsenic, and iron from water.
Karunakara Reddy started a flagship program, Community Water Centre, the company's arm for water in 2010-11. As part of the program, the company enters into an agreement with the local governing body, elected or administrative, and takes up the responsibility of execution and maintenance of the water plant for 10 years. It includes the project design, build, finance and operate. The Smaat has the capacity to build a plant which can manufacture 500 litres to 4000 liters per hour.
He became a member of Water Quality Association of the US in 2010.
He became a member of Indian Water Works Association in 2011, a voluntary body of professionals concerned and connected with water supply for municipal, industrial, agricultural uses and treatment and disposal of wastewater. The company was chosen to become one among the top 3 water-efficient companies by Confederation of Indian Industry. The company exports its products and services to 33 countries across the globe.
He won the best rural innovation award from NABARD, a bank for agriculture and rural development in 2012. He also won the Best Chief Executive Officer for 2012 from ASDF, an International Association of Scientists, Developers and Faculties. His company has won the best stall award by NIRD, a National Institute of Rural Development & Panchayat Raj. He also won Micro Small and Medium Enterprises (MSME) National Award as the Outstanding Entrepreneur for 2012.
He won the Best Innovator Award under the category of Better Entitlement to Public Services from Bihar Innovation Forum-2 by Government of Bihar.
The team of Smaat India, under his leadership, participated in Jammu and Kashmir flood relief camps in 2014. Karunakara Reddy, along with his team members, installed mobile water treatment plants to provide safe drinking water. He won the Southern Region CII Emerging Entrepreneur Award.
He conceived a mission called ‘Walk for Water’, a social awareness event on the importance of water and its conservation for future generations. An oath would be taken saying “Water Now, Water Tomorrow, Safe Water for All.” To enlist support for this program Mr.Reddy met several social influencers, celebrities, eminent people in different fields like Ramoji Rao Journalist, Media Entrepreneur, T. Harish Rao Irrigation Minister, Government of Telangana State, India, Prakash Javadekar Union Minister for Human Resource Development, Government of India, Sushma Swaraj External Affairs Minister, Government of India, Akkineni Nagarjuna Indian Film Actor,
Restoration of dried up borewells is taken up as part of Walk for Water mission. State level and national level seminars and meetings will be conducted at schools, organisations, government bodies and Non-governmental organisations. Information on water security, safety, and existing situation on water scarcity is also explained.
He won the Water Hero Award given by CNBC TV18 in 2016. He also won JalDaan Water Hero for 2017, the award presented by Government of Maharastra, India. He also inspired millions of people to take a pledge to donate five litres of safe drinking water to people who don't have access to drinking water.
Under the leadership of Mr. Karunakara Reddy, Smaat India expanded and diversified the company's activities from selling small water treatment units to a specialized solution provider for water purification, solar energy purification, mobile flood relief plant, waste water purification, sewage treatment plants, and sea water desalination plants. Smaat Aqua Technologies have started generating power from sewage.

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