OREANDA-NEWS. September 23, 2015. “ENGIE Rassembleurs d’Energies” has concluded its 13th investment, jointly with “Investisseurs et Partenaires”, the impact private equity firm, backing the growth of PEG Ghana. PEG Ghana provides sustainable electrification and innovative financing solutions, which offer personalized solar systems using “Pay-as-You-Go”[1] technology for off-grid populations.

With PEG Ghana, “ENGIE Rassembleurs d’Energies” is completing its fourth investment in Africa and its first in Ghana where lighting for three-fourths of the rural population depends upon kerosene. The objective of the company, whose workforce already numbers eighty, is to achieve rapid growth by 2019 in order to serve over 800,000 Ghanaians and thereby eliminate the release of 32,000 metric tons of CO2 into the atmosphere.

On the occasion of the PEG Ghana investment, Gérard Mestrallet, Chairman and CEO of ENGIE, declared: “Our commitment to PEG Ghana fits perfectly with the mission the Group assigned to “ENGIE Rassembleurs d’Energies”: to promote access to clean, sustainable energy through our support of social entrepreneurs.  This solution, adapted to the African market, is in keeping with the Group’s innovation and partnership approach to meet Africa’s electrification needs.”

“ENGIE Rassembleurs d’Energies” has already invested in Tanzania through EGG (Engineering Global Growth), a social enterprise active in the Dar Es Salam region and in the center and northeast of Tanzania where EGG now offers its customers personalized “PAYG” solar systems. “ENGIE Rassembleurs d’Energies” has also invested in Uganda through Fenix International, an innovative company that distributes high-quality personalized “PAYG” solar systems for off-grid populations in East Africa (Uganda, then Kenya, Tanzania, etc.).

The distribution of its products in partnership with mobile telephone operators (MTN, Vodafone and Orange), gives Fenix International high growth potential.

During first-half 2015, “ENGIE Rassembleurs d’Energies” also concluded jointly with Cofely Ineo and the Lyon group Adetel an investment in Ausar Energy. Ausar Energy designs and sells turnkey renewable power generation plants with storage capacity providing energy autonomy for isolated sites. It also delivers custom-tailored financing solutions to go with the power plant-storage unit offering.

Ausar Energy is focused particularly on Morocco, Senegal, Côte d’Ivoire and Cameroon. The combination of storage and solar power generation offer autonomous systems that are perfectly adapted to African markets and abroad, providing access to energy through electrification.

[1] The mobile telephone-based solution providing system control and method of payment.