Tunis, Tunisia, 28 January 2014 BuffaloGrid Power as service to the off-grid world Daniel Becerra, Managing Director, BuffaloGrid, ITU Workshop on “ICT Innovations in Emerging Economies” (Tunis, Tunisia, 28 January 2014)

Tunis, Tunisia, 28 January The pain 1.6billion people without access to power. For 2014, it is estimated that 750million will have a mobile phone.

Tunis, Tunisia, 28 January The pain How do they charge it? They pay the most expensive electricity in the planet

Tunis, Tunisia, 28 January USD12-17 billion – Spent in Africa on Kerosene USD million – Spent in Solar panels Off grid power – where does it come from?

Tunis, Tunisia, 28 January Solar irradiance Africa has the biggest solar irradiance in the world! So why only 1% of off-grid power is created by solar?

Tunis, Tunisia, 28 January We are facing a very price sensitive market. Dozens of companies are trying to sell their products and while power demand is growing their sales are dropping. People are just not buying them – In their minds solar panels are products that cost a lot and break after a few months. Lack of faith in solar

Tunis, Tunisia, 28 January We believe people need access to power – No ownership of inefficient power solutions. Our solution

Tunis, Tunisia, 28 January We provide our units for free to trusted entrepreneurs and run the service of providing electricity Lowering cost barrier to zero

Tunis, Tunisia, 28 January The end user pays for electricity by sending a text message – No cash involved at any point Cashless transactions

Tunis, Tunisia, 28 January Paying by SMS allow us to obtain data from our clients. This data can easily convert into cheaper or free power to our end user and information for our partners. Example: question by text – answer entitles to a free power charge. Data collection

Tunis, Tunisia, 28 January When off grid user have access to power, usage increases between 10-20% This means business opportunities of more than 2 Billion USD for MNOs in Africa a year Helping to provide power could be a very good business for MNOs With our data collection we know which MNO each of our client use – so we can offer measurable promotions. Mobile Network Operators (MNO)

Tunis, Tunisia, 28 January Scale – million off grid mobile phone users in Africa – How can we reach them all? UN Millennium goals – Universal access to electricity by 2030 – That is 16 years from now. 1.6 billion people without power – 160million people you need to reach every year! – keeping a linear equation. Challenges

Tunis, Tunisia, 28 January Decentralized power solutions is key. Business over charity – Follow MNOs example Provide infrastructure and run a service Improve service everyday – Today BuffaloGrid provides power tomorrow it will provide power and internet. We will become a Launchpad for many other services. Conclusions and Recommendations