2016 ICT4D Conference

Over one billion people in the world currently live off grid, and many use unclean energy sources like kerosene as their main home energy source. While clean energy technology has come a long way in recent years, making products available in most emerging markets, little has been done to address the affordability of this technology. Many households will spend much more than the cost of a basic solar lamp in yearly kerosene costs, but they rarely have this money at one time to purchase a clean energy product out right. Without solutions to the problem of affordability, the majority of the off grid community will continue to spend money on unclean energy sources.

This is where technically enforced "Pay-as-you-go"(PAYG) comes in. The PAYG model provides a scalable means by which to provide microloans for solar products. Each household simply redirects their "kerosene budget" to pay for the solar lantern in affordable micropayments over time. Once the lantern is paid off, the family saves significant amounts of money through reduced or abandoned kerosene expenditures. These savings can then be used to move up the "energy ladder" or to further other economic interests. Unlike a traditional solar loan program, however, technically- enforced PAYG means that when an individual doesn't pay, the solar product does not work. Individuals must make a payment on their loan to reactivate the light. Thus, the loans are self-enforcing, significantly decreasing servicing costs and increasing scalability.

PAYG financing is increasing in popularity all across emerging markets, with a number of major players offering technically-enforced PAYG products to help meet the global need. However, the majority of these PAYG providers are vertically integrated- meaning they are manufacturing and distributing their own custom PAYG solutions. To make this model feasible, they typically only offer financing for large and expensive solar products. These expensive, higher-wattage PAYG solar home systems are still not economical for a significant portion of the off-grid population. Angaza's unique business to business model addresses these additional affordability challenges and allows us to offer a range of PAYG products, from entry level solar lanterns to complete solar home systems, as technically-enforced PAYG products.

Angaza focuses exclusively on licensing a PAYG platform to manufacturers and distributors involved in energy access in emerging markets. For manufacturers, we have developed several low-cost PAYG hardware and firmware specifications to help them make their existing product line PAYG-ready, and thus able to switch on or off according to pre-payment status. For distributors, we have developed a software platform (the Energy Hub) and android application (the Activator) that allows them to register, top up, and replace solar products, as well as view product account information and configure customized payment and SMS schedules.This business-to-business approach allows us to leverage the strengths of our manufacturing and distribution partners to decrease costs and increase efficiencies across the value chain, thus better serving end users.

Structuring our company as a PAYG platform developer has allowed us to innovate rapidly in response to demand and feedback from the field. We are able to offer a variety of technically-enforced PAYG data transfer solutions to suit a variety of products and distribution models, rather than rely on one distribution model and one technical solution.





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Through Angaza's technology solutions, every kerosene dependent household can afford clean energy. Households that purchase an Angaza-enabled product also get a digital identity that can be used to move them up the energy ladder. Finally, specialization as a platform provider allows rapid scaling across many geographies. We now have distribution partners selling Angaza-powered PAYG devices in Uganda, Kenya, Malawi, India, South Africa, and Pakistan, with near-term plans for expansion into Benin, Cote D'Ivoire, Sierra Leone, Nicaragua, and Myanmar.

For the ICT4D conference, I propose to demonstrate Angaza's PAYG platform and speak to the impact it has on our distribution partners. I will also speak to the technical challenges we are working to overcome as we move towards widespread adoption of this technology, including:
Connectivity in rural areas
Mobile money/telecom integration
Smartphone availability and adoption