Africa’s energy gaps are goldmines, says richest Indian on the continent

Sitting across from Prateek Suri, Africa’s youngest billionaire and Chairman of Maser Group, it’s easy to forget that this self-made tycoon built a billion-dollar enterprise from scratch, armed with nothing but vision, grit, and relentless drive.

We meet in Lagos. The air is warm, and as the city buzzes in the background, the lights flicker, a reminder of one of the continent’s greatest challenges: electricity.

But Suri doesn’t flinch.

“This is not a problem,” he says, motioning toward the dimmed bulb. “This is the biggest clue.”

In Suri’s world, broken systems are breeding grounds for billion-dollar ideas. “Africa doesn’t hide its problems behind polished infrastructure,” he says. “It displays them, on the streets, in the queues, in the blackouts. That’s where opportunity lives.”

So how does one find those game-changing ideas in a landscape shaped by power outages, weak infrastructure, and inconsistent systems?

“Simple,” he smiles. “Solve the problem everyone tolerates.”

According to Suri, Africa’s energy crisis is not just a hurdle—it’s an open door. “You want the next billion-dollar company? Look where the generator hums. Where diesel is poured every day. Where businesses pay 30 percent extra to keep the lights on. Solve that, and you’ve unlocked the continent.”

He rattles off practical examples: affordable solar mini-grids, battery-swapping stations for boda-bodas, energy storage for mobile money kiosks, off-grid cold rooms for farmers. “You don’t need to electrify an entire country. Just power the pain point.”

Suri recalls a moment in Zambia’s markets where he saw fish traders discard half their inventory by 4 p.m. due to a lack of refrigeration. “One solar-powered insulated box there is worth more than a thousand Facebook ads,” he says. “People are waiting for real solutions, not hype.”

He believes the key to spotting scalable opportunities lies in pattern recognition. “If a hundred people are using the same workaround, that’s not convenience—it’s a sign of failure hiding a goldmine,” he says. “Look at the phone charging stations at petrol stops. Kids are doing homework under streetlights. Those are signals.”

You don’t need to be an engineer to seize these opportunities, he insists. “Find a tech partner, but first, find the need. Can you build a micro-franchise for renting solar lanterns? Offer pay-as-you-go charging for e-bikes? Lease energy as a service, like Netflix?”

Suri’s playbook is intensely local. “Africa isn’t one market. It’s thousands of micro-economies. Solve one small problem, really well, then scale city by city.”

And when it comes to validating the idea? “Forget surveys. Sit beside the person suffering from the problem. Walk with them for a day. If they’re paying more in effort than in money, that’s your signal.”

On the issue of competition, Suri chuckles. “You’ll never run out of opportunity in Africa. The only race here is who understands the street better.”

As the sun dips below the Lagos skyline and the lights flicker back on, Suri leans in with a final thought:

“Every flicker in the light is a flash of opportunity. Billion-dollar ideas in Africa don’t come from boardrooms. They come in the dark.”