Lanforce Energy
Description
Lanforce Energy is a women led for profit social enterprise in the renewable energy sector. Our major trust is to contribute towards the achievement of the United Nations sustainable development goals. The company constructs and install biodigesters for farms, households, hotels and institutions. Lanforce Energy provides access to innovative portable biodigesters which are scalable depending on energy requirements. The services are provided on Pay As You Go for affordability by all users. Lanforce Energy was founded in 2018 after realizing the challenges that women and children face in sourcing energy for cooking, cooling and lighting.
Market Opportunity/ Problem
Lanforce will provide access to biodigesters on credit. The digesters will mainly be used to power coldrooms at designated community gardens. The Coldrooms will be used to store fresh farm produce and help minimize post-harvest losses. The biodigesters will have Smart meters to monitor the performance of the biodigesters. Smart Biogas uses IoT technology and sensors to monitor digester health. The meters are attached directly to a digester’s outlet pipe and send data to the cloud via a cellular network allowing for connectivity with digesters even in remote locations. The IoT-enabled smart biogas will mitigate climate change by reducing GHG emissions by 3 to 30 tons of carbon-dioxide per unit each year. Farmers will use bio-slurry from the biodigesters in place of chemical fertilizers thus helping to enhance agricultural productivity. Women will be employed as Community-Based agents and technicians who will be the first line of representatives in the communities.
Company Information
Years of operation
4
Type of organization
Private company
Stage of the business
Growth stage
Agribusiness focus
Enabling (Cold storage)
Agriculture value chain(s) focus?
Ag-related energy
Primary country of operation
Zimbabwe
Other country(ies) of operation
How many employees does your business have?
16
Does the business have more than 30% women ownership?
Yes
Does the business have more than 30% youth ownership (under 35 years)?
Yes
Financing and expansion overview
How much capital is the company currently fundraising (US$)?
1 000 000
What is the split between equity and debt?
80 – 20