A new cohort of high-potential, founder-led cleantech businesses across Africa joins a 12-month programme designed to accelerate growth, strengthen investor readiness, and drive impact across energy access, energy transition, and waste reduction.
Endeavor South Africa and FMO, the Dutch entrepreneurial development bank, are proud to announce the 10 companies selected for the inaugural cohort of the African Cleantech Scale-Up Program 2026. The programme, starting in May 2026, supports high-potential cleantech founders building innovative and commercially scalable solutions across the Africa.
Selected from a highly competitive pool of applicants spanning 21 countries, the 10 companies on the program represent a diverse range of cleantech solutions, from solar energy financing and smart metering to AI-powered waste management and energy intelligence platforms. Together, they reflect the depth and ambition of Africa’s growing cleantech ecosystem.
The program empowers the most promising cleantech ventures across the African continent with tailored growth support through Endeavor’s network for a period of 12 months. These entrepreneurs gain access to the necessary tools to develop globally scalable solutions, by connecting them to the right business leaders and global industry experts within Endeavor’s network, providing tailored mentoring, commercial introductions and investor networking opportunities.
This collaboration between Endeavor and FMO builds on several years of successful partnership in the agri-tech space, where three cohorts of African founders were supported through Endeavor’s African Agri-Tech Scale-Up Program. The Cleantech Scale-Up Program now extends this proven model into one of Africa’s most critical and fast-growing sectors, with the goal of helping these high-impact companies scale, raise private capital and unlock the true potential of cleantech to drive economic growth, create jobs, and improve lives across the continent.
Past participants in Endeavor’s Africa Agri-Tech Scale-Up, the partnership’s predecessor, shared the following reflections on the program’s impact:
“Our one-on-one engagements with the Endeavor mentors are very insightful. These discussions helped us think deeply about our model and helped discover new revenue streams that we were not thinking about previously.”
Stephen Obe, Co-founder & CEO of Evet Inc (Cohort 3, Jul 2025 – Jun 2026)
“The program has facilitated a number of thought-provoking engagements with industry experts, in both a group context and one-on-one mentoring discussions. It has helped us shape our marketing, distribution and capital raising strategies. It also has been a fantastic opportunity for us to gain visibility and credibility.”
Deina Mayaki (DSM), Co-founder & CEO of Agriarche LLC (Cohort 2, Jan 2024 – Dec 2024)
“One of the greatest learnings was realising that we had the wrong business model. We rebuilt our foundation, aligned our team, and now have 10x the growth potential. Within half a year, our sales have grown by +200% month to month. We are very grateful to FMO and Endeavor South Africa for the impact that this program has had on our business.”
Bertrand Foffe , Co-founder & CEO of Jangolo (Cohort 1, Mar 2022 – Feb 2023)
Alison Collier, Managing Director of Endeavor South Africa, shared her excitement about the Cleantech program:
“Africa’s cleantech sector is at an inflection point, and the quality of founders we see applying to this program is a testament to that. We are thrilled to welcome this first cohort into the Endeavor network and to begin working alongside them, connecting them to world-class mentors, investors, and fellow entrepreneurs who can help them dream bigger and scale faster. The Cleantech sector not only offers very interesting business opportunities, but it is also one of the most powerful levers we have to improve lives and build a more sustainable continent.”
Alison Collier, Managing Director, Endeavor South Africa
This cleantech cohort is co-funded by Endeavor South Africa and the Entrepreneurial Ecosystem Building component of the FMO Ventures Program Technical Assistance Facility, supported financially by the Dutch government (Building Prospects) and the European Union. This component seeks to foster the maturity of the venture capital sector in targeted emerging markets by improving services of incubators, accelerators, and other entrepreneurial support organisations, as well as enabling more early-stage financing for ventures.
“Providing more investment readiness services for early stage businesses is critical in growing the cleantech sector across Africa. We are eager to collaborate with our trusted partner Endeavor to provide tailored support to this cohort of promising ventures — businesses that have the potential to reshape how energy is accessed, managed, and sustained across the continent – and to help create additional high quality investment opportunities for FMO and other active investors on the continent.”
Marieke Roestenberg, Program Manager, FMO – Dutch entrepreneurial development bank
The 2026 Cohort: 10 Selected Companies
Asoba South Africa / USA | Energy Transition
Asoba builds the data and AI infrastructure that makes distributed renewable energy readable, tradeable, and insurable at scale. The company unifies fragmented inverter and OEM data into open standards, then layers technical, operational, and commercial intelligence on top, giving asset owners, regulators, and investors a single source of truth.
Chargebyte Limited Kenya / Rwanda / South Africa | Energy Access
ChargeByte is a solar-powered, IoT-enabled infrastructure platform providing reliable energy, device charging, and connectivity in underserved and high-demand environments. The company deploys modular stations across schools, hospitals, markets, and transport hubs, enabling users to charge devices, access Wi-Fi, and stay connected even during grid outages.
DragonflyApp.ai South Africa / USA | Carbon, Waste & Pollution Reduction
Dragonfly develops physical AI agents that autonomously manage and optimise real-world operations by connecting cameras, sensors, machines, and business systems into intelligent, coordinated environments. In the cleantech space, their technology drives significant improvements in recycling recovery rates and resource efficiency through AI-powered waste stream analysis.
Earthbond Nigeria | Energy Access
Earthbond enables SMEs to transition to reliable, affordable solar energy through an integrated financing and deployment platform. The company assesses energy needs, structures tailored payment plans, and coordinates vetted local installers to deliver high-quality distributed solar systems with minimal upfront cost.
Instollar Nigeria / Kenya | Energy Access
Insollar is a clean energy infrastructure platform connecting solar companies to a vetted network of trained installers across Africa. By standardising technician onboarding, training, and quality control through a digital platform, Insollar solves the dual challenge of fragmented installer networks and youth unemployment in the clean energy sector.
PowerLabs Inc. Nigeria | Energy Transition
PowerLabs is an energy and climate tech company tackling unreliable, expensive, and fragmented power infrastructure in emerging markets. Their flagship product, Pai Enterprise, is an intelligent energy management platform that helps 24/7 and multi-site businesses maximise uptime at the lowest cost by optimising all energy sources in one place.
Switch Energy South Africa | Energy Access & Energy Transition
Switch is a South Africa-based technology company specialising in smart metering, meter data management, and energy trading solutions. Its integrated platform enables utilities, property managers, and energy traders to efficiently measure, monitor, and manage electricity and water consumption in real time.
Synafare Nigeria | Energy Access
Synafare is a renewable energy marketplace and financing platform designed to accelerate solar product distribution across Africa by connecting importers, distributors, and installers within a unified ecosystem. The company addresses critical barriers in fragmented supply chains by providing inventory financing for distributors and flexible payment options for end customers.
Thola Energy South Africa / USA | Energy Access
Thola Energy provides an AI-powered software platform that automates energy system design and deployment for commercial and industrial sites. The platform uses site and operational data to generate finance-ready outputs, including bills of quantities and standardised feasibility studies, serving as the decision layer for sustainable energy infrastructure.
TrashCoin Nigeria | Carbon, Waste & Pollution Reduction
Trashcoin operates a mobile-enabled platform that incentivises recycling across Africa by rewarding individuals and waste collectors with digital payments and essential services, including health insurance and electricity credits, in exchange for depositing recyclable materials at collection hubs. Recovered materials are aggregated and processed into high-quality recycled plastic flakes for export to international buyers.
About Endeavor
Founded in 1998, Endeavor is the leading global community of, by, and for high-impact entrepreneurs. With offices in 50+ emerging and growth markets around the world, Endeavor has a global network comprising over 5,500 mentors, 550+ investment partners, 2,900+ high-impact entrepreneurs, and over 600 staff. Predicated on the idea of paying-it-forward, Endeavor’s mission is to build thriving entrepreneurial ecosystems in emerging and underserved markets around the world by inspiring high-growth entrepreneurs to dream bigger while supporting and investing in them to scale faster, and providing a platform to give back to the network.
Endeavor South Africa is a non-profit company focused on driving inclusive growth and job creation through its support of high-growth entrepreneurs, specifically in less developed markets, leveraging its strong pro-bono global network of entrepreneurs, investors, mentors, and staff. In Africa, Endeavor’s network already includes leading cleantech businesses such as d.light, Yellow, SunCulture, and Daystar Power. Globally, the network also includes notable cleantech entrepreneurs such as Erco Energy, Solfácil, and EightTwenty Solar. For more information about Endeavor SA, please visit: www.endeavor.co.za
About FMO
FMO is the Dutch entrepreneurial development bank. As a leading impact investor, FMO supports sustainable private sector growth in developing countries and emerging markets by investing in ambitious projects and entrepreneurs. FMO believes that a strong private sector leads to economic and social development and has a 55+ year proven track-record in empowering entrepreneurs to make local economies more inclusive, productive, resilient and sustainable. FMO focuses on three sectors that have high development impact: Agribusiness, Food & Forestry, Energy, and Financial Institutions. With a total committed portfolio of EUR ~15 billion spanning over 85 countries, FMO is one of the larger bilateral private sector development banks globally. For more information: please visit www.fmo.nl