This report comprises part of Energy 4 Impact’s research programme ‘Crowd Power’ which examines the role of alternative finance, such as crowdfunding, in the energy access sector. This report provides lenders, crowd lending platforms, off-grid energy companies, and other industry stakeholders with an introduction to co-lending and syndicated financing. It explains how co-lending works, the main benefits and challenges for different participants, its relevance for crowd lending, and the key considerations for anyone developing co-lending structures. We have also developed a simplified legal agreement template, which can be downloaded on page 1 of the report. ‘Crowd Power’ is funded by UK aid through the Transforming Energy Access initiative.

Authors: Davinia Cogan, Peter Weston, Tinashe Makoni