The rural roll-out of scalable solar power in Kenya is set to accelerate with the announcement today of an innovative USD550k financing arrangement. Finance platform Lendable has secured USD550K debt financing for Raj Ushanga House (RUH), the Kenya distributor for Azuri Technologies Ltd, a leading provider of Pay-as-you-go (PayGo) solar energy solutions.
Using an innovative, data driven, “receivables financing” solution, capital is secured by future customer revenues from a high-quality portfolio of over 7,000 RUH PayGo solar customer contracts, and is the first such financing by Lendable for a PayGo energy company.
Raju Haria, CEO of Raj Ushanga House says, “The debt financing from Lendable marks an exciting chapter for RUH. It enables us to reach more customers and finance their ownership of these assets. We will also be able to significantly expand the availability and variety of Azuri solar home systems in Kenya.”
Lendable has pioneered a technology platform, which uses a proprietary risk engine to analyze the quality of diversified receivable portfolios, and enables alternative lenders to secure debt financing from experienced offshore investors purely against these portfolio cashflows. A portion of the alternative lenders’ loan book is used as security meaning there is no need to put up other collateral that is required by traditional lenders in the form of tangible fixed assets. This approach to finance enables new energy providers to scale without the need for traditional on-balance-sheet collateral, while also permitting individual projects to be financed separately.
Lendable has already secured USD.600,000.00 in debt financing for Tugende, a Ugandan company that offers a lease-to-own model to help Ugandan boda-boda drivers own their own motorcycle. Lendable is currently working on four transactions in Kenya and Uganda.
Daniel Goldfarb, CEO and co-founder Lendable commented: “We are excited to provide the investors on our platform with commercial returns while supporting positive economic and social change. We’re proud to support RUH’s mission to bring affordable and high quality solar energy solutions to more homes across Kenya. This is just the start of what we intend to be a long relationship with the RUH Team as we help them scale their lending exponentially through finance and technology.”
Steven Umidha is a data and financial journalist with over 14 years of work experience in journalism and communication.
He specialises in finance and economics reporting as well as on the causes, impacts, and solutions of global warming, conservation, pollution and sustainability, often blending scientific literacy with journalist ethics, while involving policy analysis and multimedia storytelling across various platforms in highlighting issues from biodiversity loss to ecological justice.
Besides being the Founder of Financial Fortune Media, Umidha has previously worked with the Standard Media Group, Mediamax Networks LTD, bird story agency, Business Journal Africa, and Financial Post among other outlets.
He can be reached on: Email: info@financialfortunemedia.com
Cell: +(254)726-879-488