And so, Frontier Markets decided to invest in rural women, and launched a female entrepreneur model where they recruited and trained “Saral Jeevan Sahelis” (or “Easy Life Friends”) to go door-to-door in their villages to market, sell, and deliver solar products. Through this women-centric model, Frontier Markets was able to establish its presence not just in villages, but inside village homes. We soon learned that many of the existing lighting solutions had design flaws; so, we built our own solar torch, designed with Sahelis and manufactured in India.

Throughout the mid 2010s, as rural India got increasingly electrified, our customers started asking for more than just clean energy products. They wanted appliances, smartphones, internet—and so, we started added new products to our basket. To close the access gap, we realized, we would need to be able to offer, over time, all the products and services that Last Mile customers want, but could not access. We invested in building an e-commerce app, and today, are focusing on growing our network of Sahelis and expanding our product basket so we can become the largest products and services platform for the Last Mile customer.