Startup Spotlight #79 Atık Nakit

September 2, 2021

Atık Nakit combines recyclable wastes both in homes and businesses and converts recycling tools into IOT-based containers.

We began in January 2019 at the idea stage, where the first product was a mobile app that transforms the recycling collection networks of the municipalities into digital and creates the Zero Waste system. The project’s main goal was to create a mobile app that links the consumers who produce recyclable wastes from homes and businesses to the recycling vehicles that collect these wastes with a deposit system. Another goal was to make waste management more sustainable and less costly with the use of an occupancy sensor and smart waste containers with a press inside, based on IoT. And lastly, to create a social movement that will increase the rates of household recycling in our country (10%), we are inspired by the system of countries with high recycling rates, and we offer people the opportunity to earn an income in return for their waste by giving points on the platform for every kilogram of waste given in our system. Ömer Faruk Akdağ, the co-founder of Atık Nakit shed light to their story. 

When and why did you found your startup?

Our company, which serves in smart cities, sustainability and recycling sectors, was established in 2019 as Atık Nakit Geri Dönüşüm Limited Company. The high cost of current waste collection systems, high carbon emissions, environmental pollution, and financial problems in waste management has led our company to differentiate existing products/services. Our goal is to produce sustainable solutions that will facilitate the work of municipalities in increasing urban populations. With our work, we constantly update our system according to the feedback we receive from the field, and we produce solutions for the needs of our customers after-sales.

Tell us about your team.

Atık Nakit is a team of five; Ömer Faruk Akdağ is an industrial engineer who is responsible for customer relationships and marketing. Furkan is also an industrial engineer, who is responsible for business development. Ubeydullah is a software engineer, who is in software development and design. Harun and Ismail are the mechanical engineers at Atık Nakit.

What are your key and unique features?

#sustainability #SmartCity #SaaS #Hardware

Dynamic Routing: Our solution will use real-time and historical data to optimize waste collection schedules and routes. It will enable the users to make a decision in advance and provide information about the waste bin locations.

Cost Reduction: Our solution will save on fuel, labor, and fleet maintenance costs by significantly reducing the frequency of waste collection. Our solution will be able to reduce collection costs by up to 80%.

Environmental Cleanliness: In densely populated areas, rapid waste generation often leads to overflowing waste bins and garbage dumps. Our solution will allow staff to monitor fill levels throughout the day and notify overflowing bins.

Carbon Emission: As it is known that current waste collection methods do not provide fuel efficiency to waste trucks, it creates heavy pollution. Our solution will offer ways to have fewer trucks on the road in less time. This will provide resource efficiency with less carbon emission, less noise, and less resource usage.

Tell us about numbers that matter to you.‍

With urban population growing, the amount of waste generated has reached enormous amounts. In 2016, the domestic consumption of paper consumed in Turkey, 7 million tons, while the consumption of plastics has exceeded 9 million tons. The market values here are:

• 500.000.000$ for paper

• For plastic, 1.200.000.000 $.

The household recycling rate in Turkey is 10%, with this valuable waste buried in our country to give serious damage both to the environment and also create losses for the national economy. In addition, since the collection is not separated from the source, the waste used as raw materials in recycling is procured from abroad according to the needs of the sector and creates a current account deficit. To close this gap in our country, our project was developed to collect the wastes that we cannot use at present and return them to the recycling system. More than 9 million kg of waste has been collected, and the recycling rate has been increased from 8% to 27% and the formation of 88 tons of carbon emission has been prevented.

What are your plans for the next year and the next five years?

We have collaborated with 7 municipalities in Turkey. Our first goal is to work with 25 customers at the end of 2022. In 5 years, we want to serve our solutions to European and Middle Eastern countries.


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