Participated · Seed · Aug 2022

Koolboks builds solar-powered refrigeration units with internal batteries and IoT to provide reliable cold storage where grid power is unreliable. The company sells refrigeration as a pay-as-you-go service, allowing customers to purchase cooling in monthly token payments. Koolboks operates in 28 countries and has more than 10,000 units across Nigeria. With new funding, it plans to open an assembly plant in Nigeria within 12–18 months to produce 72,000 refrigerators a year, create about 450 jobs, and cut prices by up to 20%. The startup is launching trade-in initiatives (Koolbuy and Scrap4New) and exploring monetising carbon savings to improve affordability. Since 2022 it has grown fundraising to about $18 million in total, including an $11 million Series A. Koolboks builds off-grid solar refrigeration units that can operate as refrigerators, freezers and lighting, storing cooling energy (using water and the sun) for up to four days without grid power. The units include LED lights and USB ports and come in 110–1,000 liter sizes. The company sells via a pay-as-you-go model—customers pay roughly $10–$20 monthly through mobile payments or POS agents to unlock usage tokens. Founded in 2018, Koolboks pivoted from a camping-refrigerator product to focus on business customers in emerging markets in 2020 and now sells across 18 countries while maintaining physical offices in Lagos and Paris and an affiliate office in Kenya. The startup has acquired over 3,000 unique customers and reports that the entire transaction volume it recorded in 2021 was achieved in the first two months of this year. Koolboks plans to use new capital to expand across Nigeria, build a local assembly facility and team, and catalyze entry into additional African markets such as DRC and Ivory Coast.