Organisation:
Co-founder - SELCO Solar Light Pvt. Ltd.
Location:
Bangalore
Problem:
NA
Solution:
Dr. Harish Hande holds Bachelor’s degree in Energy Engineering from Indian Institute of Engineering (IIT), Kharagpur and a Doctorate in Energy Engineering (Specialization in Solar) from the University of Massachusetts (Lowell). He is Managing
Director,SELCO-India, a company he co-founded with Neville Williams in 1995. Dr. Hande is on the boards of many national and international organizations.
SELCO Solar Pvt. Ltd, the social enterprise with aim to offer sustainable energy solution services established in 1995. The organisation was devised to break the myths that poor people cannot afford, maintain sustainable technologies and social enterprise cannot function as commercial companies. SELCO offers complete package of product, finance and service. Through innovative financial products, families with an average income of less than Rs 3,000 a month are able to afford SELCO’s services. Historically, such families did not qualify for rural banks’ financial schemes which were geared towards agriculture. However, with SELCO acting as a guarantor to banks, to provide affordable loans to rural families and simultaneously showing how electrification can dramatically increase the economic productivity of these families
Scalability and Impact:
Since 1995, the company have sold, serviced and financed over 1,35,000 solar systems to their customers and achieved that sustainable enterprise can create a difference.
Financial Requirements:
NA
Awards and Recognition:
SELCO INDIA under the leadership of Hande has won the Ashden Award for Sustainable Energy 2005 and Accenture Economic Development Award for 2005.
In 2007 SELCO INDIA again won the Ashden Award, this time for “Outstanding Achievement” in energy sector.
Hande was named the Social Entrepreneur of the Year 2007 by the Schwab Foundation for Social Entrepreneurship
In 2008, Hande was chosen by Business Today as one of the “21 young leaders for India’s 21st century”
In June 2008, India Today named him one of the 50 pioneers of change in India
In 2011 he was awarded the prestigious Ramon Magsaysay Award
Harish Hande was also awarded the Karnataka Rajyotsava Prashasti in 2011 by the Government of Karnataka
In 2013 the Trustees of University of Massachusetts awarded him the “Doctorate of Humane Letters”