Raising incomes of people in Africa and Asia with clean energy
Shell Foundation seeks partnerships with aligned innovators and organisations that reach millions of the people we serve
Partner with Shell Foundation
Shell Foundation finds and fosters early-stage innovation that increases incomes while cutting emissions for a smallholder farmer, a micro-entrepreneur and a transporter.
We scale innovations by partnering with established businesses operating in Africa and Asia and already reaching millions of customers. We finance scale and innovation with capital commitments that catalyse concessional and commercial finance.
Across our programmes, we co-design interventions with gender intentionality embedded every step of the way.
What we seek
We want to hear from aligned organisations who believe profound change can come from clean energy solutions that raise incomes while cutting emissions. These could include:
Innovators
Developers of customer-centric hardware that increases incomes and reduces emissions, or digital platforms that connect people to new products, services and markets. If you have a clear path to scale, we want to hear from you.
Scale partners
Proven sector leaders already reaching millions of smallholder farmers, micro-entrepreneurs and transporters that target scale, who seek to generate new markets and customer bases, to find new income drivers and new sources of capital through climate finance.
Finance partners
Those designing or already in market with instruments that provide appropriate growth finance to ventures or address affordability for customers.
The funding provided by the Shell Foundation has been instrumental in scaling Davis & Shirtliff’s PAYGO solar pumping business, enabling us to reach and empower smallholder farmers. This support allows us to accelerate the adoption of sustainable solar pumping solutions, helping farmers access reliable water resources and improve productivity. Together, we’re creating pathways for resilience and growth in rural Africa”
Shell Foundation’s investment criteria
Our investment criteria is designed to ensure that our philanthropic capital is used effectively to support the alleviation of poverty and protection of our environment by increasing incomes of millions of people in Africa and Asia whilst lowering emissions. We prioritise investments that:
- Align with our objectives: All investments must be consistent with Shell Foundation’s mission and objectives
- Consider scale and depth of impact: We seek investments that have the potential to reach millions of people in the markets we operate, with long lasting impact that increases customer incomes by 20%+
- Demonstrate our additionality: We focus on investments where our philanthropic capital is incremental and catalytic, complementing existing efforts and encouraging additional capital and partnerships
- Ensure financial viability: We consider investments that have a solid plan towards achieving financial viability within a specified time frame
- Comply with ethical and legal standards: We require investments to adhere to all applicable ethical and legal standards
What we offer
Shell Foundation has two decades’ experience in scaling energy technology that improves the lives of people earning less than a net living wage. Our experience, in-market knowledge and approach allows us to:
- Work with agility through our partnerships, co-designing appropriate models to achieve mutually agreed outcomes
- Be customer-focused through intervention design, backed up by consumer research and human impact analysis
- Take catalytic risk through pilot programmes and inclusive financial solutions
Get in touch
If you think we’d be a good fit, let us know in this short form and we’ll be in touch.
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