A small team of engineers working out of a Gahanna lab has reached more than 1 million people across Africa with hand-pump technology that tackles water poverty, one community at a time.

Design Outreach, the Christian nonprofit co-founded in 2013 by CEO Greg Bixler and COO Abe Wright, recently crossed that milestone with two products: the LifePump, a heavy-duty hand pump now operating in 12 countries and serving more than 468,000 people, and the MaxLife Centralizer, a small blue plastic component installed in six countries and reaching more than 480,000 people.

The numbers matter locally. The organization works with nearly 70 expert volunteers at its Gahanna headquarters to build products that address a stark reality: an estimated 200 million people in sub-Saharan Africa rely on roughly 700,000 traditional hand pumps for clean water. Those pumps endure 12 or more hours of daily use and frequently break down, according to the Columbus Dispatch. When they fail, residents turn to hand-dug wells or springs that carry diseases like cholera.

Bixler told the Dispatch that 30% to 40% of traditional pumps in communities break and remain broken, driving people back to contaminated water, as NBC4 also reported in July. The rubber centralizer in those pumps accounted for 75% of failures. His team's replacement, the MaxLife Centralizer, has dramatically extended pump life.

"Pumps that were lasting even just three weeks with [the old centralizers] and breaking down are now running for over two years with these, and then it was just that simple of a replacement," Bixler told the Dispatch.

Nearly 2,000 pumps equipped with the new component are already operating in Malawi.

Bixler and Wright met in 2010 through an organization called Water for Good. At the time, Bixler worked as an engineer at Battelle and Wright at Johnson & Johnson company DePuy Synthes. They installed their first LifePump in Malawi in November 2013.

Now the organization has offices in three countries, including two field offices and a sister organization in England. Its goal: reach 10 million people by 2030, with most of those in Malawi. Bixler told the Dispatch the organization believes it can eradicate water poverty in that country for about $10 million, roughly a dollar per person.

Design Outreach has also joined international groups as a technical leader in the effort to replace leaded components in traditional hand pumps. Residents interested in supporting the organization can find its "Beyond Measure" campaign at doutreach.org.

Bixler is scheduled to participate in World Water Week in Stockholm, Sweden starting Aug. 23, where he will address the issue of leaded pump components before an international audience.