Yellow, which is Africa’s asset financier for solar energy and digital devices within the country, has officially raised $14 million series B funding during a round led by Convergence Partners with participation from the Energy Entrepreneurs Growth Fund, which is managed by Triple Jump, in addition to follow-on investment from Platform Investment Partners.
Yellow as initially launched back in 2018 in Malawi by founders Mike Heyink and Maya Stewart with in initial goal to bring solar energy to the country of Africa, which is among those with the lowest access to electricity in the world.
The company has since created an impressive footprint across the country as well as increased their product offerings to include electronics such as smartphone devices.
Now that they have had a successful funding round, they aim to deepen their reach in its current markets Malawi, Rwanda, Uganda, Zambia, and Madagascar.
Additionally, they will launch digital and financial products in near-term, and prepare for future debt funding rounds to ramp up its growth.
“The newly injected capital is being used to leverage more debt finance to reach more customers with financed smartphones and solar systems. While the business will broaden its product offering to include other mobile financial services, growth will be fueled primarily by deepening our expertise in our existing product categories,” Yellow founder and CEO Mike Heyink said, according to TechCrunch.
“It’s incredibly exciting to see the early stages of sustained growth in Africa. The team at Yellow is thrilled to be on the multi-decade journey with the African consumer, to a better life. We have a front-row seat to witness millions of people prospering as a result of joining the digital global economy for the first time,” Heyink continued.
Convergence Partner CEO, Brandon Doyle, said of their investment in Yellow, “we are excited to be backing the Yellow team. We have been tracking the off-grid solar power asset finance space for many years but have failed to find a business model and team that we felt we could back until now.”
“Yellow’s offering also sits well with our promise to our investors of strong investment returns married with solid social development impact; in this case by tackling the triple challenge of financial inclusion, green energy distribution, and broadband penetration, and doing so profitably while servicing the unbanked communities of the lowest income countries of Africa.”
Yellow has secured the necessary funding for their growth, as many other founders use a VC investor search engine to help them on their journey. Congrats to Yellow.
