Trace - Build the tool that lets Indian manufacturers answer one question honestly.

You're building Trace: a resource consumption tracker for Indian SME manufacturers (50–500 employees) that turns scattered operational data into one honest, auditable sustainability number per production batch. This is not a carbon calculator. Not a pledge dashboard. Not a gamified green-behaviour app. It's a tool that takes real inputs from a real factory floor and produces a real output so that when a buyer asks "how much water per unit?", Rohini the procurement manager can answer in 30 seconds with a number she can defend. Four operational realities you must design around: Data lives in 4 places at once. Water on the MIDC/TANGEDCO bill, electricity on MSEDCL, raw materials on WhatsApp PDFs, waste in a pencil-maintained storekeeper's register. The person entering data is not a sustainability officer. It's Ramu the store in-charge with a Class 10 education, or Priya the accounts assistant doubling as payroll. Production is batch-based, not continuous. Batch 247 is 3,000 blue polos for a German buyer. Batch 248 is 1,500 white kurtas for a domestic brand. Buyers want the footprint of their specific order. Nobody will pay for this. The business model is not your problem. Build for adoption. Build exactly these five features. Nothing more. Feature 1 - Batch Setup (2 minutes max) Staff creates a new batch with six fields: batch ID (free text), product type (dropdown: garment / leather goods / food processing / ceramic / paper / other), number of units, start date, and primary raw material (free text). No complex forms. Feature 2 - Resource Log (the core feature) Against each batch, staff can log four resource types, with multiple entries per type per batch allowed: Water: litres + source (municipal / borewell / tanker). If tanker, cost per litre. Electricity: kWh consumed. If solar contributes, solar units separately. Fuel / Thermal: litres of diesel or kg of LPG or coal, with type dropdown. Waste: kg of solid waste, type (fabric offcuts / chemical / food / mixed), disposal method (landfill / recycler / composted / unknown). Each entry has a date and optional note field. Feature 3 - The Batch Report Card When a batch is marked complete, Trace generates a Report Card showing: total water + water per unit, total electricity + kWh per unit, total fuel + fuel per unit, total waste + waste per unit, and a comparison to the previous batch of the same product type (or a placeholder if it's the first batch). Plus one plain-language observation generated by logic, not AI: "Water consumption per unit increased 18% compared to your last batch of this type. Check if the dyeing process changed." The Report Card must export as a PDF that prints correctly on A4 and is readable without a screen. Feature 4 - The Honest Number (Sustainability Score) At the top of every Report Card: one number out of 100. Calculated with this exact formula, no deviations: Start at 100. Deduct: Water per unit above 50 L: deduct 1 point per 10 L above threshold (max 20) Electricity per unit above 2 kWh: deduct 1 point per 0.5 kWh above threshold (max 20) Any fuel used: deduct 10 points. Zero fuel: no deduction. Waste disposal "landfill" or "unknown": deduct 15. "Recycler": deduct 5. "Composted" or zero waste: no deduction. Tanker water used (any amount): deduct 10. Municipal or borewell: no deduction. Minimum 0, maximum 100. Exact deduction breakdown shown alongside the score. No gamification. No badges. Just the number and the math. Feature 5 — The Trend Line A dashboard showing all batches logged, their scores over time as a line chart, and a table of the 3 highest-scoring and 3 lowest-scoring batches. No projections. No forecasts. Hard constraints (non-negotiable) Works on a mobile browser on a basic Android phone (2GB RAM, Chrome, 4G) Every screen loads in under 3 seconds on 4G No login required to try it. A pre-loaded demo factory (6 months of mock data) must be accessible from the landing page without signup Sustainability Score formula implemented exactly as specified — judges will verify the math on test data PDF must render correctly on A4 — judges will print it English is mandatory. Hindi or Tamil optional. Do not add any feature not listed above. Scope discipline is part of the evaluation. The Validation Requirement Find one real person who works at or runs a small manufacturing unit — garment, food, leather, ceramic, anything physical. Have them attempt to log one batch on your tool. Watch them try. Document where they got confused, where they succeeded, whether the Report Card made sense. If you can't find a manufacturer, find someone in supply chain, procurement, or factory operations.