Africa

The holy grail in venture capital is to invest in a “unicorn” — a startup that achieves a valuation of over $1 billion. But as…

In the early 2000s, a small-scale World Bank pilot project in Bangladesh unexpectedly grew into the largest off-grid solar…

Universal electrification is the key to unlocking sub-Saharan Africa's vast potential. But according to Brad Mattson at Husk…

It's time for NextBillion's “Most Influential Article of the Year” contest, in which we select our 12 most-read articles from the…

Impact investors typically rely on output measurements, such as total capital invested or number of people served, to assess…

If the world hopes to address climate change, large corporations must transition away from fossil fuels for their power needs. To…

Last mile distributors (LMDs) are key to bringing life-changing products to hard-to-reach consumers, and innovation is essential…

On March 11, 2020, the WHO declared that the COVID-19 outbreak had become a pandemic. Since then, it has become a global…

In 2019, close to 760 million people did not have access to electricity, and around 4 billion still lacked access to clean,…

In the last decade, the off-grid solar industry has become a key solution to quickly deliver clean energy access to low-income…

As another pandemic year ends with the rapid global spread of a new COVID-19 variant, it’s becoming clear – if it wasn’t already…

Africa is home to bountiful reserves of metals and minerals such as gold, diamond, cobalt, bauxite, iron ore, coal and copper.…

Editor’s note: This article is part of NextBillion’s series “Recovery 2021,” which explores how businesses, development…

Energy efficiency is often overlooked as a key to unlocking higher tiers of energy access. Efficiency for Access, a global…

Agriculture drives sub-Saharan Africa’s economies, contributing around 23% of the region’s GDP. And access to energy can help…

The recent High-level Dialogue on Energy, the first U.N. gathering of world leaders in more than 40 years solely devoted to…

More private investment. More government support. More mini-grids or less mini-grids. Mesh grids. Combo grids. AgriGrids. Wind…

We’ve all read the articles on sub-Saharan Africa’s growing tendency to leapfrog the rest of the world in establishing widespread…

While the pandemic has caused illness and death, decimated livelihoods and disrupted the daily lives of billions across the…

In emerging and remote marketplaces across the globe, low-income consumers rely heavily on last-mile distributors (LMDs) for…