- Bboxx to scale up clean cooking partnership across Rwanda with TotalEnergies Marketing Rwanda following a successful pilot of Pay-As-You-Go (PAYGo) LPG.
- The partnership will see Bboxx providing its innovative technology and PAYGo finance model and TotalEnergies Marketing Rwanda LPG cylinders.
- Partnership demonstrates viability of partnership model in extending clean cooking access and marks first stage of expansion across Africa, targeting many more people over the years to come.
Kigali, 10 July 2024 – Bboxx is partnering with TotalEnergies Marketing Rwanda to scale Liquid Petroleum Gas (LPG) clean cooking in and beyond Kigali, Rwanda, following a successful pilot programme in 2023, with plans to increase significantly its impact in the years to come.
For this clean cooking roll-out, Bboxx is providing its own technology, the Smart Cooking Valve, which sits on top of the LPG cylinder, and TotalEnergies will provide the cylinders and gas. The Smart Cooking Valve, launched in August 2023, is a device that revolutionises gas usage; it locks onto the LPG cylinder and digitally controls customers’ gas access based on their mobile money payments, enabling a pay-as-you-cook financing model. Few households can afford an entire gas refill in one payment, so this flexible payment system allows customers to pay for their day-to-day gas usage and reap the economic and health advantages by switching from traditional cooking methods like charcoal to more affordable and less polluting LPG.
The initial test phase of the pilot programme demonstrated great demand for the PAYGo kit, with higher than usual cylinder rotation. The partnership model enables universal clean cooking access, with TotalEnergies Marketing Rwanda financing the cylinder and gas for customers, and Bboxx ensuring collection payments. This provides financial flexibility for the customer and expands the LPG offering to a wider market. This partnership creates a brand-new clean cooking business model which has the potential to scale across the entire continent – Bboxx and TotalEnergies Marketing Rwanda plan to reach many more people over the years to come by providing cylinders with Smart Cooking Valves.
Mansoor Hamayun, Co-Founder and Chief Executive Officer, Bboxx, said: “Pursuing clean cooking expansion is a huge part of Bboxx’s mission to bring essential products and services to underserved communities and we are both honoured and excited to embark on this clean cooking deployment with TotalEnergies Marketing Rwanda. Bboxx is building on the release of the Smart Cooking Valve last year and applying its PAYGO model to the existing clean cooking industry, enabling us to extend access to more families. When we look at the bigger picture, access to clean cooking facilities leads to more lives saved.”
Ronan Masseron, TotalEnergies Country Chair and Managing Director in Rwanda, said: “Through partnership and innovation, Bboxx and TotalEnergies Marketing Rwanda are lighting the path towards clean cooking access in Rwanda and beyond. By combining Bboxx’s pioneering technology with TotalEnergies’ commitment to sustainability, we’re not just providing LPG cylinders, we’re delivering economic empowerment and health benefits to thousands.”
The partnership of Bboxx with TotalEnergies Marketing Rwanda marks a crucial development in the clean cooking space. Currently, 2.4 billion people still rely on traditional cooking methods, which often leads to harmful health effects, often with fatal consequences, particularly for women and children. The success of this partnership and clean cooking deployment would demonstrate that there is scope for more LPG units to expand across the continent using this business model.
ENDS
Notes to Editors
About Bboxx:
Bboxx is a data-driven super platform, transforming lives and unlocking potential by connecting consumers and deploying innovative products across Africa.
Bboxx is championing the economic empowerment of Africa, accelerating the transition to the digital economy, and creating new markets. We have built Bboxx Pulse®, a fully integrated operating system, and combined it with an extensive on-the-ground network to connect customers with clean energy, clean cooking, smartphones, e-mobility and selected financial products – many for the first time.
We are connecting both underserved rural communities and aspiring urban ones with a highly convenient and affordable way to access life-changing solutions, through last mile logistics and data-powered innovative financing methods. We offer our services on a pay-as-you-go basis to households, businesses, and communities, enabling African consumers to unlock their potential.
We build strategic partnerships with investors, utilities providers, global companies, and governments to accelerate growth and provide a wide range of products to consumers in Africa. Our partners are seizing a massive market opportunity by plugging into Bboxx – developed through green tech and big data and designed for scale.
Following the successful acquisition of solar energy front runner PEG Africa in 2022, Bboxx is now positively impacting the lives of more than 3.6 million people in 10 operating markets, directly contributing to 11 of the 17 United Nations Sustainable Development Goals. Bboxx and its group of companies is one of the largest networks in Africa, with over 4,000 staff across Africa and offices in the UK and Asia.
For more information about Bboxx please visit bboxx.com and follow us on social channels LinkedIn and Twitter.
About TotalEnergies:
TotalEnergies is a global integrated energy company that produces and markets energies: oil and biofuels, natural gas and green gases, renewables and electricity. Our more than 100,000 employees are committed to provide as many people as possible with energy that is more reliable, more affordable and more sustainable. Active in about 120 countries, TotalEnergies places sustainability at the heart of its strategy, its projects and its operations.
About the Marketing & Services division of TotalEnergies:
TotalEnergies’ Marketing & Services business segment offers its customers a wide range of broad energy products and services—petroleum products, biofuels, charging and related services for electric vehicles, gas for road and maritime transportation—to support them in their mobility and help them reduce their carbon footprint. Every day, over 8 million customers visit our 15,000 service-stations all over the world. As the world’s number four in lubricants, we design and sell high-performance products for the automotive, industrial and maritime sectors. And to provide the best response to the needs of our B2B customers, we deploy our sales forces, our international logistics network and our diverse offering. We operate in more than 100 countries, where our nearly 30,000 employees stand close to all of our customers.
Cautionary Note
The terms “TotalEnergies”, “TotalEnergies company” or “Company” in this document are used to designate TotalEnergies SE and the consolidated entities that are directly or indirectly controlled by TotalEnergies SE. Likewise, the words “we”, “us” and “our” may also be used to refer to these entities or to their employees. The entities in which TotalEnergies SE directly or indirectly owns a shareholding are separate legal entities. TotalEnergies SE has no liability for the acts or omissions of these entities. This document may contain forward-looking information and statements that are based on a number of economic data and assumptions made in a given economic, competitive and regulatory environment. They may prove to be inaccurate in the future and are subject to a number of risk factors. Neither TotalEnergies SE nor any of its subsidiaries assumes any obligation to update publicly any forward-looking information or statement, objectives or trends contained in this document whether as a result of new information, future events or otherwise. Information concerning risk factors, that may affect TotalEnergies’ financial results or activities is provided in the most recent Registration Document, the French-language version of which is filed by TotalEnergies SE with the French securities regulator Autorité des Marchés Financiers (AMF), and in the Form 20-F filed with the United States Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC).
For more information please contact:
Bboxx / Impact and Influence
Email: bboxx@impactandinfluence.global
Contact:
Nicholas Moore
nicholas@impactandinfluence.global
+44 7527 695154