Last week, SOLARKIOSK’s leaders and Managing Directors from across the continent convened in Berlin to partake in a 3-day workshop entitled: CSMC 2.0 – Innovation, Development, and Growth. The workshop took place at M√ºnzsalon in Berlin-Mitte, where some of the company’s sharpest minds deliberated on the future of the Connected Solar Market Center (CSMCS), 23 of which are currently in operation across Rwanda, Tanzania, and Kenya.

The CSMC is one of the most innovative and powerful off-grid concepts for rural economic development that currently exists in Africa. A CSMC provides a modern space for hosting a diverse range of independent businesses, each run by a local entrepreneur. These selected microbusinesses tap into the energy supply of a central E-HUBB while also taking advantage of the state-of-the-art infrastructure and holistic support provided by the SOLARKIOSK country teams.

As the CSMC network is expected to grow exponentially in 2018, SOLARKIOSK is currently looking to develop new, innovative ways to empower more rural, young entrepreneurs and help them grow their business within the CSMC framework. The aim of the workshop in Berlin was to bring together creative and business-savvy minds from SOLARKIOSK’s Headquarters in Berlin as well as from its affiliates across Africa to collaboratively brainstorm new business opportunities and productive use cases that could be introduced and bring to life the next generation of CSMCs: the CSMC 2.0.

Needless to say, the workshop provided SOLARKIOSK with lots of new ideas which will be critically evaluated against a number of criteria including return on investment, impact, and feasibility over the next few weeks. We’ll keep you posted on the latest developments so stay tuned!