Global Good

Global Good is a peer-to-distributor lending app that decreases the cost of solar for Africans without power.

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Inspiration

Pay-as-you-go solar panels are currently unaffordable to Africans with no power. Global Good is a peer to distributor lending platform that increases the length of an African Pay as You Go solar panel loan. This makes the monthly cost of power much lower for those using solar panels. Due to high capital costs in Africa, solar panel loans are usually only 1 to 2 years and unaffordable for many Africans. Global Good would assist in creating loans with a maturity of up to 5 years, in some cases halving the user’s monthly solar loan cost.

What it does

We have a new model for ‘Pay-as-you-go Solar’. We use the existing equipment and support the existing distributors. We spread out the monthly payments and reduce the upfront costs. So, for example, for a ‘solar lighting’ kit, instead of paying $20 per month and $50 upfront, a small household might pay $10 per month and $30 upfront.

Our solution is to create a peer-to-peer funding mechanism that goes through a distributor. So, it’s really “peer-to-distributor”, but it ensures that your funding goes to the household that you funded and that the payments go towards the solar panel.

How we built it

Our hackathon team created a web and mobile responsive application to solve this problem using Python with Django and JS libraries. The web application allows the investor to view their active loans and view additional loans that they can invest in.

Challenges we ran into

We had challenges with deploying the Python with Django to a hosted environment (Heroku).

Accomplishments that we're proud of

Creating a working prototype that looks great.

What we learned

How to be effective at Django and JS!

What's next for Global Good

Half of us work in the solar/energy industry, so this is a viable product that we can expand on to create social good.

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