GREENLIGHT-PLANET-INC
22.9.2020 15:02:45 CEST | Business Wire | Press release
Greenlight Planet Inc., the largest provider of solar-powered home energy products in sub-Saharan Africa and South Asia, has secured $90 million in new funding to expand its Pay-As-You-Go (PAYG) solar consumer financing business and consolidate its debt portfolio. Akira Partners and Orrick Herrington & Sutcliffe advised Greenlight Planet.
Under its Sun King brand, Greenlight Planet operates the largest direct-to-consumer PAYG solar distribution and service network in the world, having delivered over 1.3 million PAYG solar products to date in Kenya, Tanzania, Uganda, and Nigeria, expanding at a rate of over 65,000 new rooftop solar installations per month. The company employs 1,250 full-time staff worldwide, and over 5,500 sales agents, 30% of whom are women, across areas of sub-Saharan Africa suffering from high levels of unemployment.
The new debt and equity investments were provided by European development finance institutions CDC Group, FMO, and Norfund, along with impact investors ResponsAbility, SIMA Funds, Symbiotics, Global Partnerships, and private equity firm ARCH Emerging Markets Partners’ Africa Renewable Power Fund. Of the total $90 million in committed funding, $69 million has been disbursed to the company, with the balance to be drawn down as the company delivers additional solar-powered home energy systems, with end-consumer financing, to homes in Africa.
Sun King solar products include home lighting, mobile phone chargers, radios, televisions, and fans, as well as the solar panels and batteries to power these appliances. During the global COVID-19 pandemic, such solar-powered home energy systems have proven all the more essential to families spending more time at home. Families depend on Sun King energy access and appliances for light, communication, entertainment, and access to news and information.
Greenlight Planet’s Sun King solar-powered home energy systems have a profound social impact for off-grid families around the world. Sixty million individuals across 65 countries have used them to access clean, renewable energy. This access to energy increases the time children spend studying, increases productivity for small businesses, and reduces spending on old-fashioned energy products. Sun King products have saved over $3.4 billion on fossil-fuel-based energy costs, reducing global greenhouse gas emissions by more than 14 million metric tons.
T. Patrick Walsh, Co-founder and CEO of Greenlight Planet added, “Greenlight Planet’s goal is to bring affordable, clean energy to every under-electrified household that needs it. After a decade of honing our solar technology and our solar distribution, installation, and service strategy, we are now jumping the last hurdle to solve this global challenge, that being financial inclusion. We are expanding access to consumer financing, making basic solar power available to all people, at a cost as low as $0.15 per day. We are delighted to work with CDC, Norfund, FMO, ResponsAbility, SIMA Funds, Symbiotics, Global Partnerships and ARCH to expand access to finance and access to energy.”
Geoffrey Manley, Director and Head of Energy Access and Efficiency at CDC Group added, “Our financing of Greenlight Planet provides our team with a great opportunity to support a company that is creating jobs and taking meaningful strides to fight climate change. We’re thrilled that our commitment promotes the UN’s Sustainable Development Goals, helping to facilitate economic development across the African continent.”
William Barry, Managing Director at ARCH Africa Renewable Power Fund (ARPF) added, “ARCH ARPF is delighted to support Greenlight Planet’s continued growth as it delivers on its mandate to expand energy access across sub-Saharan Africa. Greenlight's global market leadership in the off-grid solar sector positions the company strongly within ARPF’s expanding off-grid renewable energy portfolio, complementing our existing utility-scale, independent-power-producer development pipeline.”
About Greenlight Planet
Greenlight Planet is a social-mission, for-profit business that since 2009 has sold over 13 million of its Sun King solar home energy products to off-grid customers in sub-Saharan Africa and South Asia. The company reaches customers through its direct-to-consumer distribution and financing network, as well as wholesale partnerships with over 300 commercial and non-profit last-mile distributors, ranging from mobile network operators, to microfinance institutions, to oil and gas companies, to NGOs. Greenlight Planet’s Sun King products are currently installed in over 65 countries and have served 60 million people.
Find out more at https://www.greenlightplanet.com .
About the Off-Grid Solar Industry:
Relevant (unaffiliated) aggregators of industry information include the Global Off-Grid Lighting Association and Lighting Global (a platform of the World Bank Group, to support sustainable growth of the international off-grid solar market)
www.gogla.org
www.lightingglobal.org
View source version on businesswire.com: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20200922005395/en/
Link:
Social Media:
https://www.facebook.com/SunKingIndia/?brand_redir=106681909393159
About Business Wire
Subscribe to releases from Business Wire
Subscribe to all the latest releases from Business Wire by registering your e-mail address below. You can unsubscribe at any time.
Latest releases from Business Wire
Heaviside Industries Awarded $99M IDIQ Contract to Provide MOTH Spectrum Analyzers to U.S. Army29.9.2026 14:00:00 CEST | Press release
MOTH’s low size, weight, power, and cost enable distributed spectrum awareness in support of U.S. Army EMSO priorities Heaviside Industries, a builder of multi-domain precision munitions platforms, announced it has been awarded a $99 million firm-fixed-price, indefinite delivery, indefinite quantity (IDIQ) contract by the U.S. Army to deliver its MOTH radio frequency (RF) spectrum analyzers in support of the Army’s electromagnetic spectrum operations (EMSO) priorities. This press release features multimedia. View the full release here: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20260929455358/en/ The five-year contract was awarded by U.S. Army Contracting Command at Aberdeen Proving Ground, Maryland and includes system procurement, fielding, upgrades, and sustainment. As unmanned systems proliferate and adversaries increasingly exploit the electromagnetic spectrum, the Army requires EMSO capabilities that are scalable, adaptable, and rapidly fieldable to maintain an advantage in the spectr
Royal Yacht International Represents Buyer in Landmark 132M Lürssen as Founder Predicts: “The Billion-dollar Yacht Is Coming”29.9.2026 14:00:00 CEST | Press release
The Monaco-Miami advisory firm is building a different model for ultra-high-value yacht acquisitions, combining access, negotiation, technical expertise and selective, founder-led representation. Royal Yacht International has announced PROJECT M, a fully custom 132-metre Lürssensuperyacht exceeding 6,000 GT. But for Royal Yacht International Founder and CEO Tommaso Chiabra, the project is less about size than what it represents. This press release features multimedia. View the full release here: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20260928365204/en/ Project M At the very top of the luxury market, the world’s most exceptional yachts are becoming increasingly difficult to reproduce. Only a small number of shipyards can execute projects of this scale. Construction takes years. Specialist capacity is finite. Build slots are scarce. And replacement cost can change dramatically between contract signing and delivery. “People look at purchase price. Sophisticated owners look at replacement
Kyowa Kirin and Knight Therapeutics Enter Into Exclusive Distribution Agreement for POTELIGEO® (mogamulizumab) for Cutaneous T-Cell Lymphoma (CTCL) Patients Across Latin America29.9.2026 14:00:00 CEST | Press release
This agreement marks the first introduction of Kyowa Kirin's POTELIGEO® in Latin America and expands access for patients.Knight Therapeutics to exclusively distribute POTELIGEO® across Argentina, Brazil, Colombia and Mexico.The agreement supports Kyowa Kirin’s mission to address barriers to diagnosis, treatment access and disease awareness for CTCL patients across the region. Kyowa Kirin International, a wholly owned subsidiary of Kyowa Kirin Co., Ltd. (TSE:4151, Kyowa Kirin), today announced the signing of an exclusive distribution agreement with Knight Therapeutics (“Knight”) (TSX: GUD) for the distribution of mogamulizumab in select countries in Latin America. Under the terms of the agreement, Knight will be responsible for seeking the necessary regulatory approvals and commercialising mogamulizumab for mycosis fungoides (MF) and Sézary syndrome (SS), two subtypes of CTCL, a rare non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma, in Argentina, Brazil, Colombia and Mexico. Knight will hold exclusive distributi
Create Apps Championship Winners Highlight Dubai’s Strength as a Base for Scaling Digital Businesses29.9.2026 13:49:00 CEST | Press release
Winners of past editions of Dubai Chamber of Digital Economy’s Create Apps Championship have highlighted how Dubai is helping entrepreneurs transform promising ideas into scalable digital ventures, with the championship playing a key role in supporting their growth. This press release features multimedia. View the full release here: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20260929068961/en/ During Create Apps Championship 2025 (Photo: AETOSWire) Launched in 2023 as part of the ‘Create Apps in Dubai’ initiative, the championship supports participants through specialised training, mentorship, connections with investors and partners, and funding to develop and launch winning apps. Mariam Mohammed Almarri, Co-Founder of Boom, said: “A major milestone in our journey was participating in the Create Apps Championship, where Boom was recognised as ‘Dubai’s App of the Year 2025’ and ‘Most Impactful App’. This recognition enabled us to build Boom and transport it from an idea into a real product.
SLB OneSubsea Awarded Major Subsea Systems Contract for Rovuma Basin Development29.9.2026 13:46:00 CEST | Press release
Agreement with ExxonMobil Moçambique, Limitada supports development of LNG deepwater resources in Mozambique Global energy technology company SLB (NYSE: SLB) today announced that its OneSubsea™ joint venture has been awarded a contract by ExxonMobil Moçambique, Limitada, on behalf of its Area 4 partners, (ENH, CNPC, ENI, KOGAS and XRG), to deliver subsea production systems for the first phase of the offshore Rovuma LNG project in Mozambique. This press release features multimedia. View the full release here: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20260916187961/en/ SLB OneSubsea™ joint venture has been awarded a contract by ExxonMobil Moçambique, Limitada, on behalf of its Area 4 partners, (ENH, CNPC, ENI, KOGAS and XRG), to deliver subsea production systems for the first phase of the offshore Rovuma LNG project in Mozambique. The contract scope includes the delivery of subsea trees, manifolds, umbilicals and associated control systems designed to support efficient production from the
In our pressroom you can read all our latest releases, find our press contacts, images, documents and other relevant information about us.
Visit our pressroom