At nine years old, Harris Siddiqui stood in a California apartment and watched water flow from a faucet for the first time.
After 18 years working in public water systems, Siddiqui saw a persistent problem from the other side of the tap: utility staff were responsible for thousands of buried pipes they could not directly see, often learning which ones were failing only after leaks or breaks occurred.
The scale is enormous. EPA estimates that aging pipes and water mains lose about 2.1 trillion gallons of treated drinking water nationwide each year.
Siddiqui founded [**Infractiv**](https://www.linkedin.com/company/infractiv/) to help utilities move from emergency response toward risk-based planning. The company combines civil engineering, predictive modeling, deep learning and geospatial intelligence to estimate where pipe failures are most likely.
That information can help a water system identify high-risk infrastructure and direct limited investment toward pipes where failure could cause the greatest disruption or cost.
The approach is designed for systems of different sizes and staffing levels, including utilities that lack extensive data teams. The objective is not to eliminate engineering judgment, but to give water professionals better evidence before deciding which pipes to inspect, repair or replace.
Making buried infrastructure more visible can save water, reduce emergency work and help communities invest before the next break forces the decision.
Infractiv is part of The Water Council’s 2026 BREW 2.0 cohort, supporting water technology companies as they move toward broader commercial adoption. Learn more: https://lnkd.in/gkpnNbjj
waterloop is a nonprofit news outlet exploring solutions for water sustainability. Visit https://www.waterloop.org/
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