Samsung Electronics announced that it has successfully concluded a project with the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation to develop a prototype toilet for the world's poorest communities.
The South Korean tech giant held a "closing ceremony at the Samsung Higher Institute of Technology, the research and development arm, in Suwon, south of Seoul, for the project to reinvent the toilets it has participated in for the past three years at the foundation's request," Yonhap News Agency reported.
"The institute recently completed the development of basic toilet technologies and developed a prototype for home use," the company explained, adding that the toilet is "energy-saving and has the capacity to treat effluents."
The foundation's website notes that the challenge to reinvent the toilet began in 2011, through the Water, Sanitation and Hygiene Program under the Gates Foundation "to generate innovative solutions that can protect people and communities from pathogens transmitted by human excreta and enable governments to deliver truly comprehensive sanitation services." that reaches the poorest communities.
The company was quoted by Yonhap News Agency as saying that Lee Jae-young, Samsung Electronics' vice president, shared the results of the project with Bill Gates when the latter visited Seoul last month.
At the meeting, Lee pledged to continue using Samsung's technologies to "help meet the challenges facing humanity."
Samsung revealed that it plans to grant licenses for the project's patents to developing countries during the commercialization stage without asking for intellectual property fees.
Samsung said Lee and Gates have been in close contact to update each other on the project.
The foundation states that more than 3.5 billion people around the world live "with inadequate sanitation, which caused more than half a million deaths due to diarrhea in 2016."