Why Sutro is Better: Five Years And Two Continents in Development

Sutro started 5 years ago. Ravi Kurani, our founder and CEO, had an idea — how to “fix” water.

Ravi worked at his dad Harry’s pool store when he was a kid. He was also a pool boy who has probably done way over 10,000 manual tests in his lifetime. Ravi knew that the majority of problems that he had to fix were due to inconsistent pool testing. Roughly his Dad’s shop would get panicked, customers would call that their pool was green, or foaming, or smelled funny and that they needed to get their water fixed pronto.

Ravi went to college in Riverside and got a degree in Mechanical Engineering. He was, albeit briefly, a rocket scientist with NASA (JPL to be exact), working on a more effective way to burn rocket fuel. Sounds fun huh :-).

Ravi’s curiosity and entrepreneurial spirit led him to India where he worked on solving the problems with contaminated water. It turns out that the majority of the world’s problems revolve around having access to clean water.

Reason #1: We are Experts in Water Testing because Ravi grew up with a pool

It’s All About What’s in the Water

Ravi’s adventures in India gave him the idea that before you can treat water, you have to test it to see what’s wrong with it. Sounds simple enough but you’d be surprised that no one was doing that. The problem, as Ravi will tell you, is trying to sell a new technology to a government is like climbing a pole slick with grease — you never seem to get anywhere.

Once Ravi came back home, he realized that his ambitions to make water safe had to start small — like the size of your backyard pool. Small.

A Backyard Chemistry Experiment

If you have a pool (or spa for that matter), you know that it’s really a large backyard chemistry experiment that will test your mental and physical patience and prowess. Water is complicated. Even though it’s a simple bonding of Two Hydrogens and One Oxygen and it makes life on earth possible. In fact, it’s essential for every single living thing on planet earth including green, mustard, and black algae that live in an untreated pool.

Your backyard chemistry experiment is complex and needs a lot of TLC in order to make it safe for you to swim. Ravi’s experience taking care of over a 1,000 pools taught him that consistent testing, that’s accurate, will keep your pool (or spa) water safe. That led him to develop the first Sutro prototype.

Reason #2: We took a manual process that anyone can do and automated it to make it repeatable and more accurate.

What You Get for $699

We know that it’s important to test your pool (or spa) water regularly to ensure that it’s crystal clear and ready for a swim. An investment in a Sutro Smart Monitor will ensure that you’ll always be ready for a swim. Here is what you get when you invest in the best pool (and spa) water testing robot: