Brands
Boon’s WaterAI app wins iF Design Award 2026 for intuitive water insights
Award honours platform that turns complex water data into clear insights
MUMBAI: Water technology company Boon has scooped the prestigious iF Design Award 2026 for its WaterAI mobile application, a platform that transforms complex water quality data into an intuitive digital experience.
The award, given in the Mobile Application category, recognises the app’s ability to translate real time water information into a format that is easy to understand, visually engaging and meaningful for everyday users.
Founded in 1953, the iF Design Award is widely regarded as one of the world’s most respected design honours. The 2026 edition drew more than 10,000 entries from 68 countries. A jury of 129 international design and sustainability experts selected the winners after a detailed evaluation process, making the recognition particularly competitive.
For Boon, the award signals a shift in how water technology is presented to users. Instead of technical dashboards and complex monitoring systems, the WaterAI platform focuses on clarity, storytelling and everyday usability.
The app brings the hidden life of water to the surface by turning real time data on pH levels, total dissolved solids, pressure, temperature, flow and filter health into visual cues and interactive insights. The experience is designed to feel less like monitoring infrastructure and more like keeping an eye on daily wellbeing.
Built around Boon’s signature blue and orange design palette with green accents, the platform blends advanced monitoring technology with a clean, human centred interface. Users can track system performance, observe water quality trends and receive alerts when attention is required.
Boon founder and chief executive Advait Kumar, said the recognition validates the company’s belief that technology and design should work hand in hand.
“Winning the iF Design Award 2026 is a proud milestone for us. Water technology has traditionally been built around anxiety, contamination alerts and complex compliance dashboards. With WaterAI, we wanted to make the invisible visible and turn complex water data into something people can understand and engage with every day,” he said.
Launched in 2025, the WaterAI platform is already used by industry stakeholders across Africa, Asia and Europe. It forms part of Boon’s broader ecosystem that combines filtration technology, IoT monitoring and premium product design.
Today, the company’s technology is used by more than 400 corporates and hospitality properties across 11 countries, helping organisations track and maintain safer water systems in workplaces, hotels and public spaces.
The winners of the iF Design Award 2026 will be honoured at an official ceremony in Berlin on 27 April, where designers and innovators from around the world will gather to celebrate this year’s standout ideas.
Brands
Dunkin’ Donuts to exit India as Jubilant FoodWorks ends 15-year franchise deal
The quick service restaurant giant is ending a 15-year franchise partnership with the American doughnut chain, even as it renews its Domino’s agreement for another 15 years
NOIDA: Dunkin’ is done in India. Jubilant FoodWorks Ltd, the country’s leading quick service restaurant operator, has decided not to renew its franchise agreement with the American coffee and doughnut chain, and will wind down its Indian stores in a phased manner before December 31, 2026, bringing a 15-year partnership to a quiet, loss-laden close.
The decision, approved by JFL’s board on March 30, 2026, ends a relationship that began with a Multiple Unit Development Franchise Agreement signed on February 24, 2011. JFL will now evaluate and undertake what it described in a regulatory filing as the “rationalisation and/or cessation of certain operations and/or sale, transfer or disposal of assets and/or assignment or transfer of franchise rights,” all in consultation with Dunkin’s brand owners and strictly within the terms of the original agreement.
The numbers tell the story bluntly. In the financial year 2024-25, Dunkin’ India posted a revenue of Rs 37 crore against a loss of Rs 19 crore — a haemorrhage that was always going to test the patience of a parent company recording revenues of Rs 6,104 crore and a profit of Rs 194 crore in the same period. Doughnuts, it turns out, were never going to move the needle.
The contrast with JFL’s handling of its other marquee franchise could hardly be sharper. Even as it walks away from Dunkin’, the company has just doubled down on Domino’s, signing a fresh Master Franchise Agreement on March 31, 2026, granting it exclusive rights to develop and operate Domino’s Pizza stores in India for 15 years, with an option to renew for a further 10.
JFL, incorporated in 1995 and promoted by the Bharatia family, operates a network of more than 3,500 stores across six markets — India, Turkey, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka, Azerbaijan and Georgia. Its portfolio includes Domino’s and Popeyes on the global side, and two home-grown brands: Hong’s Kitchen and COFFY, a café brand in Turkey.
For Dunkin’, India was always a stretch. The brand never quite cracked the cultural code in a market where filter coffee and chai command fierce loyalty and where the doughnut remains, at best, an occasional indulgence rather than a daily habit. Fifteen years, mounting losses and a parent with better things to spend its capital on was always going to be a difficult equation to solve.
The doughnut has had its last day. The pizza, however, is staying.
