Bengaluru women win Cartier awards

Two Bengalureans are among 33 women worldwide to win the Cartier Women’s Initiative Fellowship. The Fellowships, by the French luxury brand, are given to women entrepreneurs who are creating a social impact through their business.

Ira Guha, who runs Asan Cup, won the Fellowship under the Regional Award South & Central Asia category, while Akshita Sachdeva, who started Trestle Labs, was awarded under the Diversity, Equity and Inclusion category. They received the awards at a ceremony in Shenzhen, China, in May.

Trestle Labs is known for its product Kibo, a device that makes hand-written, printed and digital content accessible to the visually impaired through an audio app. Launched in 2019, Kibo currently has over 1,00,000 users and is used in over 600 institutions, they claim.

While Asan’s menstrual cups have a patented design and can be used for 10 years, it’s the company’s social initiative that played a major role in securing them the award. “For every cup we sell, we donate one to an individual in rural India. We now have more than 20,000 Asan cup users in Kanakapura,” shares Ira, who founded the company six years ago.

The winners went through a rigorous application process, Ira says. After a written application, they were required to send in a video. This was followed by the Cartier team interviewing the companies’ partners, team members, investors, customers.

Akshita states that the award has helped boost the Koramangala-based company’s visibility on the global stage. The Fellowship includes financial support from Cartier Women’s Initiative, a social entrepreneurship programme with INSEAD, a France-based business school, and human capital support. “This win will also aid in expanding and improving the business,” she adds.