SunFI, a Nigerian clean tech firm, has announced a $2.325 million initial round. The investment, according to the company’s CEO, Rotimi Thomas, would help SunFi increase its operations and strengthen its capacity to propose the best systems at the lowest cost to customers.
Factor[e] in Nairobi and Sterling Bank’s SCM Capital Asset Management led the finance. Voltron Capital, Norrsken Impact Accelerator, Ventures Platform, and Sovereign Capital are among the other investors.
A Look At What SunFi Does
Founded in 2022, the startup specialises in matching families and companies interested in solar energy access with appropriate payment options.
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SunFi adds value to clean energy investors by reducing the technical and credit risk associated with financing portfolios of solar solutions, hence opening the door to lending as a service for clean energy providers. Thomas described the business concept as follows:
“Our current revenue model relies on margins charged for the payment plans. Our value proposition is sticky as we enable solar installers to scale by addressing their end-to-end value-chain needs.
“In addition to accessing payment plans in as little as 24 hours, they can design optimized solar-inverter-battery solutions, aggregate equipment demand for better supply chain terms, access a wide installer network, and activate remote monitoring capabilities.”
SunFi has onboarded over 40 solar system vendors to its platform at various stages of verification since its official launch in Q1 2022; 10 are its primary providers, serving over 129 consumers. Through its agreements with financial institutions, the one-year-old energy firm has distributed more than $600,000 to these clients in the last year.
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The energy company offers two payment options to clients: lease to own (after an initial deposit, customers make payments in instalments before owing the solar system) and subscription model (customers pay to use the solar system monthly).
SunFi does not produce or instal solar panels, but it does provide small solar enterprises with expert assistance on selecting the best manufacturers on the market. SunFi hopes to eliminate the need for solar providers to seek financing from financial institutions by filling the credit gap.
Charles Rapulu Udoh
Charles Rapulu Udoh is a Lagos-based lawyer, who has several years of experience working in Africa’s burgeoning tech startup industry. He has closed multi-million dollar deals bordering on venture capital, private equity, intellectual property (trademark, patent or design, etc.), mergers and acquisitions, in countries such as in the Delaware, New York, UK, Singapore, British Virgin Islands, South Africa, Nigeria etc. He’s also a corporate governance and cross-border data privacy and tax expert.
As an award-winning writer and researcher, he is passionate about telling the African startup story, and is one of the continent’s pioneers in this regard