Gaurav Manchanda

Born in India and raised in the United States, Gaurav Manchanda has had a lifelong fascination with technology and the impact it makes on our lives. As a child Gaurav would often bring electronics from the US to his cousins in India and saw firsthand the pronounced benefits that technology has in lower-income countries.

In 2007 Gaurav moved to Liberia, where he was sponsored by the Clinton Foundation to serve as an advisor to the Deputy Minister of Health. What struck him most about post-conflict Liberia was the lack of reliable electricity. Every evening in Monrovia, children would gather outside his apartment to study under his building’s security lamps, and health clinics would shut down early each day because they could only do procedures in bright daylight. Gaurav became determined to use his role to help improve access to power in the country.

After securing millions of dollars in funding from the World Bank to help the Ministry of Health bring renewable energy to clinics, Gaurav left the Clinton Foundation to found One Degree Solar. His goal was to empower people in countries like Liberia where light and power are vital to development.

Drawing on his own experiences as well as working with local Liberians, he wanted to create products that could power three basic needs: light, mobile phones, and radio. Lights allow businesses and clinics to stay open longer, children to study more hours and families to enjoy each other’s company at night. Mobile phone penetration has skyrocketed in recent years, but cheap and affordable ways to keep phones charged have been elusive. Radios, largely powered by dry-cell batteries, are relied upon by families across the developing world for news and entertainment.

ODS is driven by the need for sustainable products that charge people’s lives, and by the idea that these products can be delivered without sacrificing quality or affordability.