All On: How Shell-funded impact investor lights up Nigeria’s off-grid energy markets

Nigeria, Africa’s largest economy, has been unable to provide adequate electricity supply for its over 200 million people as well as businesses operating in the country. With power generation constantly hovering in the region of 4,000 megawatts, epileptic power supply has become the norm and businesses incur huge costs to keep their machines running. The national grid, which is the major source of electricity supply for the country, has experienced its seventh collapse since the beginning of 2022.

Amid this scenario, industry experts have harped on the need to look for solutions in alternative energy sources. The experts say Nigeria can look towards solar, which the country has in abundance, and other off-grid sources to provide power to unserved and underserved areas.

In this regard, All On, a Shell-funded impact investment company, has played an active role in driving the growth of off-grid energy in Nigeria, providing investment funding and other forms of funding support to renewable energy companies. All On says it is on a mission to increase access to commercial energy products and services for underserved and unserved off-grid energy markets in Nigeria with a special focus on the Niger Delta,

Partnership with USADF

In 2018, All On entered a partnership with the US African Development Foundation (USADF) to develop, scale up and promote the use of renewable off-grid energy technologies to reach communities not served by existing power grids in the country.

At the Nigerian Off-Grid Energy and Innovators Summit 2018 organised by the All On-USADF partnership, 10 energy companies were selected for funding, including Havenhill Synergy Limited, Prado Power, Solmenz Engineering, A4&T Power Solutions, Darway Coast, Alyx Limited, Eastwind Laboratories Limited, and Auxano Solar in the mini-grid category, and Creeds Energy and i-Kabin Integrated Resources Limited in the solar household systems category.

The All-On-USADF collaboration was to co-finance innovative Nigerian off-grid energy companies and was to seed up to 30 companies in the country within three years. The USADF would provide $50,000 in seed capital while All-On would also provide $50,000 in convertible debt to each of the selected energy enterprises in the first year. Another set of companies were also to enjoy same privileges in the second year and later in the third year.

Wiebe Boer, then CEO of All On, said at the event that the biggest challenge hindering Nigeria’s economic and social development is access to energy.

“These off-grid energy companies are introducing innovations that will improve household livelihoods and local economies by providing affordable power to unserved and underserved communities. We are proud to partner with USADF to provide an innovative blend of financing to these companies to enable them to scale up and meet the increasing demand,” Boer said.

Some of the beneficiary companies said the financing would assist them to scale up production and distribution.

“The USADF-All On funds will facilitate the scale-up of our lease-to-own standalone solar systems to over 100 SMEs in Plateau and Rivers States, with affordable instalment repayments. By transitioning to standalone solar systems, SMEs save up to 50 percent on daily fuel spend on generators, which can be channelled into growing their business and productive activities,” said Hannah Kabir of Creeds Energy.

NCIC partnership for clean energy 

All On also entered into a grant funding partnership with the Nigeria Climate innovation Centre (NCIC) to support the incubation of clean tech businesses.

The partnership with All On, said Bankole Oloruntoba, CEO of the NCIC, at the kickoff of centre’s incubation programme, was the “first of many partnerships that will help in creating a pipeline of viable, clean energy innovation-driven ventures and expand the viability of the Nigerian green economy”. For Boer, it was a partnership that “will enable All On to identify, accelerate, and scale new indigenous clean energy innovations in the country”.

Niger Delta Off-grid Energy Fund

The Niger Delta Off-grid Energy Fund is the result of a partnership between All On and the Bank of Industry (BOI) to facilitate the deployment of energy solutions by access-to-energy companies in the Niger Delta at 10 percent interest rate per annum (with a one-year moratorium) and tenor of up to seven years. The N1 billion fund, projected to encourage off-grid energy companies to deploy in the Niger Delta and address the massive access to energy gap in the region, is funded equally by the two institutions but domiciled with and operated by the Bank of Industry.

At the signing ceremony for the agreement, Olukayode Pitan, managing director of BOI, described power as “a critical resource towards achieving industrialization” and “a major cost driver for SMEs in Nigeria”. He said the deployment of the fund would provide “clean energy at affordable interest rate and friendly conditions not only to SMEs, but also to households and communities in the Niger Delta region of the country”.

All On also entered into a partnership with Rubitec Academy to provide distributed solar training programmes for indigenes of the Niger Delta and persons working within the region. Under the Niger Delta Off-Grid Energy Scholarship Programme, All On offered a scholarship which funds up to 50 percent of the cost of the training provided by Rubitec Academy.

“We are proud to be part of the Nigerian energy revolution through renewable energy, and it is an honour to be selected by All On as partners on this initiative. This scholarship will help bridge the identified gap of available skilled personnel due to increasing demand for renewable energy products and services,” said Bolade Soremekun, CEO of Rubitec Solar.

Funding support to renewable energy companies

On 31 March 2020, at the onset of Covid-19, All On announced an assistance of N180 million to renewable energy companies Auxano, Arnergy, GVE and Lumos to provide solar power for emergency health centres in support of the response to fighting the COVID-19 pandemic. The four companies, all investees of All On, were selected based on their immediate preparedness to respond with products, inventory, technical capabilities and their efficient delivery track record.

In April, All On announced the completion, by GVE Projects Limited, of a 9.6Kw solar and 30kWh battery storage solution at the Rivers State COVID-19 Isolation Facility located at the Eleme General Hospital, Ogale Nchia, Rivers State. The solar-powered installation, consisting of 30 panels and 16 batteries with the capacity to store up to 30Kwh of power for the isolation facility, was carried out using the fund from All On’s N180 million COVID-19 Relief Fund (CSR).

In June 2020, All On announced a partnership with Renewvia Energy Corporation, which said it had connected hundreds of households in Akipelai and Oloibiri to its mini-grids, to electrify rural communities unserved by conventional utilities in the Niger Delta. The agreement incorporated a commitment of $1.2 million from the impact investing company to enable Renewvia to develop and operate solar mini-grids to bring clean energy, and ultimately spur economic development in the region.

Investment deals

In September 2020, All On and Auxano Solar Nigeria signed a $1.5m investment deal for solar panel assembly plant expansion. The investment was projected to guarantee the expansion of Auxano’s solar panel assembly capacity by over 50 percent, according to Afolabi Akinrogunde, All On programmes and investments manager.

“This continued support from All On is in response to an increase in demand of our goods and services. It is also an indication that Nigerians are increasingly becoming more accepting of solar as an alternative to on-grid energy and diesel generators,” Chuks Umezulora, COO of Auxano Solar, said.

All On has provided investment funding to many other renewable energy companies, such as NXT Grid, Solstroem (an investment deal to make carbon markets more accessible to solar off-grid operators), Salpha Energy Limited ($1m investment deal for solar home systems distribution), Infibranches ($2m investment deal to drive growth in the Nigerian renewable energy sector), and many more.

Following the signing of the investment deal with Infibranches, which All On described as an innovative business model that merges fintech and renewables and poised to enable tens of thousands of new electricity connections in the country, Olusola Owoyemi, its CEO, said the company plans, through the investment, to speed up customer acquisition in its current markets.

In June this year, All On and Greenage Technologies signed a $500,000 investment deal for expansion of a solar equipment manufacturing facility in Enugu State.

Ogechukwu Uchechukwu, co-founder and head of business development at Greenage Technologies, said the investment “will help Greenage realize its aim of becoming Africa’s largest solar electronics manufacturers by doubling its existing manufacturing capacity for inverters, charge controllers, and the possibility to assemble lithium-ion batteries”.

In the same month, All On and Koolboks signed a $500,000 investment deal for deployment of solar-powered refrigeration systems in Nigeria, an investment which, according to Koolboks, would “ensure the scaling up of our business operations”.

“It is a win for small businesses, a win for us, and a win for the planet at large,” said Ayoola Dominic, CEO of Koolboks.

In August 2022, All On and Mobile Power Limited signed a £1m investment deal to expand deployment of pay-per-use battery sharing platform in Nigeria.

The deal, said Christopher Longbottom, CEO, Mobile Power Limited, would “accelerate growth in household energy and replacing urban generators”.

Since it began operations in mid-2021, Mobile Power has deployed over 40 hubs in Ekiti and Ondo States in South-Western Nigeria, with 20,000 households and 1,000,000 rentals. This is one of the fastest rates of energy access project deployment in the Nigerian off-grid energy sector.

Mobile Power is looking to roll out multiples of its current deployment numbers across Nigeria over the next year and the All On Investment would help power its ambitious pan-Nigerian deployment and expansion drive.

Moving ahead

All On is living up to its mission to support the deployment of innovative and user-friendly renewable energy solutions, particularly for Nigeria’s under-served and unserved markets. One source described the company as the most prominent mini-grids investor in Nigeria.

But the company is not relenting. As Afolabi Akinrogunde, acting CEO and investment manager of All On, implied during the signing of the £1 million investment deal with Mobile Power Limited, the company is continuing in its effort to provide commercially sustainable decentralized renewable power solutions to Nigerians going forward.