SolarHome, a Singapore-based energy startup with presence in Myanmar, has raised a pre-Series A round led by impact investment firm Uberis Capital.
The company said the round was oversubscribed with participation from Beenext VC and other regional investors.
Prior to that, SolarHome had secured a seed funding from Singapore venture builder Forum Capital. The total fundraising of the startup to date is $1.1 million.
SolarHome provides Pay-As-You-Go (PAYG) solar home systems, targeting the bottom-of-pyramid population in Southeast Asia. The model enables customers to “rent to own” plans of energy service subscription, offered at as low as $3-15 per month.
The startup is operating in Myanmar as its maiden market, and will use the proceeds from the fundraising to increase its installations to over 10,000 units in the next year.
Claiming to be the first player in this area, SolarHome said the market opportunity for solar home systems was substantial in Southeast Asia, with over 150 million people and close to 27 million households living off-grid.
“The PAYG model has emerged as a clear leader in off-grid electrification in Africa, India, and Latin America, having reached millions of homes and attracted over $500million of investment over the last few years. We see the same tailwinds in Southeast Asia,” commented Nicolas de Boisgrollier, managing partner at Uberis Capital.
“PAYG is very scalable and operates profitably without subsidies, which makes this business model very attractive,” he added.
SolarHome’s PAYG scheme allows customers to purchase energy tokens for daily, weekly or monthly top-up credits, either through scratch cards or mobile money. The ownership of these systems will be automatically unlocked and transferred to the customer after two years.
Greg Krasnov, managing director of Forum Capital, is also chairman of SolarHome. Forum Capital is focused on the segments of financial inclusion and consumer finance in Southeast Asia. It said SolarHome was its third business to close an oversubscribed funding round over the past few months.
Meanwhile, the financing for SolarHome has brought the total number of investments by Uberis Capital in Southeast Asia to eight companies.
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Forum Capital-backed SolarHome to invest $25m in Myanmar over five years
