The d.light S250, our solar-powered lantern and mobile phone charger, is currently on display in the British Museum as the 100th object in BBC Radio Four’s “A History of the World in 100 Objects.” Neil MacGregor, the museum’s curator, has written a book called “A History of the World in 100 Objects.” MacGregor appeared on PBS NewsHour to talk about his book. The d.light S250 was one of the objects Jeffrey Brown interviewed MacGregor about.

Zolli says relatively few social entrepreneurs will succeed. One company that has is d.light. Almost 2 billion people worldwide live without electricity. Mainly they use dangerous and dim kerosene lamps for light. So d.light has developed a line of safe and affordable substitutes.

The d.light S250, our solar-powered lantern and mobile phone charger, is currently on display in the British Museum as the 100th object in BBC Radio Four’s “A History of the World in 100 Objects.” Neil MacGregor, the museum’s curator, has written a book called “A History of the World in 100 Objects.” MacGregor appeared on Comedy Central’s Colbert Report to talk about his book. The d.light S250 was one of the objects Stephen Colbert interviewed MacGregor about.

More than 20 projects have continued after students completed the course, and some are now on the market. Examples include d.light, a company that makes solar-powered lights for people without access to reliable electricity.

Joan Hamburg chats with co-founder of d.light, Ned Tozun about his mission to enable households living without reliable electricity to attain the same quality of life as those with electricity.

d.light design has launched one of the world's most affordable solar lanterns. Priced at $8, this lamp is designed for millions of people who have no access to electricity. "The d.light S1 makes bright and clean solar lighting accessible for base-of-the-pyramid households who want a better life for themselves and a better future for their children," Donn Tice, CEO, d.light design said.

A few years back, d.light, a startup that began as a Stanford design school project, announced that it had created the world's cheapest solar lantern. For you, with your electric lights, this doesn't seem like a big deal. For everyone who relies on kerosene (and all of its associated fumes) for lighting, it's a life-changer. It's newest offering, the S1, is designed specifically to help students.

The energy market is ruthlessly competitive. American consumers want cold beer and warm showers from low-cost utilities, and the "green-ness" of the electricity is of minimal concern to the average user. This pits solar firm versus solar firm and wind power firm versus wind power firm. More broadly, this mindset pits renewable energy against the entrenched incumbents of coal, gas and nuclear, which are armed with their $0.09 per kilowatt-hour power.... Amidst this furious economic struggle, it's easy to lose track of some of the softer benefits of distributed energy and renewables, as well as the humanitarian aspects of the green energy business and its people.

When number 100 in the BBC and British Museum’s “A History of the World in 100 Objects” was unveiled last year, the judges’ choice was surprising. The list that started with the Olduvai handaxe – man’s first tool to control the environment – would end with the d.light solar-powered lamp. . . . The lamp can potentially transform the lives of the 2bn people globally who have no access to power, spending an estimated 70 per cent of their income on firewood and kerosene.

Next year could be an inflection point for Kiran - the kerosene killer. d.light, the company that makes these solar power lanterns, has just reorganized its supply chain in anticipation of a scale-up. "We moved the entire design operation to Hong Kong from India and we now have a manufacturing facility in Shenzhen, China," says Sam Goldman, co-founder, d.light design.

Imagine, as a manufacturer, that your potential market is two billion consumers worldwide. This almost inconceivable figure is the ultimate scale of d.light's ambition, a consumer-products company set up by a pair of social entrepreneurs in 2007 to design and produce lighting solutions for the one in four people on this planet who live without electricity. With two million lives already positively affected by d.light's innovative solar-powered lamps and counting, the company's story is only just beginning.

Ask a developer of off-grid lighting about a solar lantern and he'll tell you about a kerosene tragedy. A child killed in Benin. A dormitory burned to the ground in Tanzania. Countless men and woman across Asia, Africa and elsewhere suffering -- and some dying -- from respiratory ailments. The poorest people on the planet together spent almost $40 billion last year on kerosene and other rudimentary and dangerous fuel-based lighting.

That's why, at next year's G-whatever meeting in France, world leaders would do well to rip up those big checks to tin-pot autocrats and channel the cash to startups instead. Help those companies make cheap, useful products to sell to the world's poor, who will use them to become less poor, and everybody wins.

The runaway success of a newly-designed solar lantern has come to spell new hope for the power-starved hinterland of the country. Launched in October last year, the Kiran, or S10, a kerosene lantern replacement for rural India and Africa, is priced at Rs 549 and lasts up to eight hours on a single day of solar charging.

Almost a third of the world's population earns $2.50 or less a day. The enormity of this disparity takes my breath away, but there's an interesting flip side to it: That's a market of more than five billion dollars a day. Add the next segment ($5 a day) and it's easy to see that every single day, the poorest people in the world spend more than ten billion dollars to live their lives.

Around 1.5 billion people, or more than a fifth of the world’s population, have no access to electricity, and a billion more have only an unreliable and intermittent supply. Of the people without electricity, 85% live in rural areas or on the fringes of cities. Extending energy grids into these areas is expensive: the United Nations estimates that an average of $35 billion-40 billion a year needs to be invested until 2030 so everyone on the planet can cook, heat and light their premises, and have energy for productive uses such as schooling.

In rural communities of Africa -- where more than 95 percent of homes have no access to electricity -- solar energy has the power to transform lives. Globally, 1.5 billion people, one quarter of the world's population, live without electricity, according to a United Nations report. Those who can afford any power at all spend large proportions of their income on kerosene for lamps or travel to larger towns to charge their batteries several times a week.

Omidyar Network, the philanthropic investing firm of eBay Inc. founder Pierre Omidyar, plans to plough as much as $200 million into India in the next five years. The organization’s target: businesses and non-profits that can make a “social impact” and improve life for people on the lowest economic rungs.

A solar lamp designed by an Indian company in California and marketed successfully in India has won the Green Oscar, a top award for new sources of energy. The solar lamp has brought light to many a dark home and after a resounding sales success in India, the solar lamp - d.light - has been awarded the Ashden Award for sustainable energy.

We've followed the Ashden Awards before because they find and bring attention to technologies around the world that are helping to drive a sustainable energy revolution... They've just announced the latest round of winners, and the solar lantern from India-based d.light design is among them.

The developers of a solar lamp that aims to replace kerosene-burning lights in developing countries have won a prestigious environmental award. d.light says its lanterns contribute to the reduction of carbon emissions.

d.light, the startup making solar-powered LED lanterns to improve lighting in the developing world, landed $5.5 million earlier this week. But it’s made news again, revealing the identity of its lead investor: the Omidyar Network, the do-good investment firm founded by eBay founder Pierre Omidyar and his wife Pam.

Every night at 6 p.m., the electricity in Bhojaka, India, shuts off. Until recently, the residents of this quiet, rural hamlet -- several hours' drive from bustling Delhi -- had no recourse after dark. Electricity was supplied to meet the needs of the owners of rice, wheat, and sugarcane fields around town. When the farming stopped at sundown, the lights went off.

Experience of extreme conditions can provoke change—and innovation. Sam Goldman spent four years as a Peace Corps volunteer in the Republic of Benin in West Africa between 2001 and 2005. He lived without electricity, relying on kerosene lamps for light. A meeting with his neighbour's son in Benin—who had been badly burned in a kerosene-lamp fire—convinced Goldman that an alternative to the hazardous kerosene lamp had to be found.

Everyone knows cleantech is a hot investment category in the US. But what about in such emerging markets as India? On a recent tech tour of Bangalore, Delhi and Mumbai, I found that India has its share of entrepreneurs and investors who want to save the world.

Their mission is to bring light to millions of households that do not have access to electricity. Betting big on solar lighting products, Sam Goldman and his team have embarked on an enduring journey to remove darkness from the remotest corners of the world.

What do you get if the 1960s and a banker on Wall Street had a baby? Social entrepreneurism. Though it has a long history, it's been a buzzword since Muhammed Yunnus and his Grameen Bank won the 2006 Nobel Peace Price for lifting people out of poverty through microloans.

At first glance, the Kiran solar-powered lamp made by d.light is just plain cute--it would look right at home in an Apple store. But the real news is that it could save people in the developing world a substantial amount of money, and spare the atmosphere millions of tons of carbon dioxide.

On Tuesday, d.light released its latest product, the Kiran... Quite frankly, this little lamp is a big deal. There are more than 1 million deaths every year attributed to kerosene lamps; 62% of the people who die are under the age of fourteen.

d.light has dubbed their newest solar lantern "The Kerosene Killer." That's because it is the cheapest, relatively high quality solar lantern on the market. d.light has been aiming to wipe kerosene from the face for awhile now, and they might have just come out with something that could do the trick.

When the sun goes down, much of the world goes dark. At home productivity sinks--you can't read or learn without light--unless you can afford to buy kerosene, which emits noxious fumes.

d.light has designed the world's most affordable solar lantern which will be available on the market shortly. The Kiran solar lantern is designed specifically for families living in developing countries who do not have access to a reliable source of electricity.

Costing just $10 dollars the "Kiran" solar lantern aims to illuminate the lives of the 1.6 billion people in the world who live without access to mains electricity, relying instead on dangerous and dirty kerosine lanterns to light their homes.

Last spring, when we first wrote about Sam Goldman and Ned Tozun, founders of d.light, they were one of BusinessWeek's America's Most Promising Social Entrepreneur Finalists... d.light checked in to tell us they are about to globally launch the Kiran lamp.

Companies which design products for rural markets and focus on the ergonomics and usage requirements have done well. New Delhi-based d.light is one of those companies whose vision is to equip households without electricity in rural areas with affordable solutions.

Three Indian companies have found place on the list of 100 promising private clean technology companies in the world. The list, the first-ever of its kind, recognises companies offering solutions to the world's most pressing environmental challenges.

It's a playful name for a serious company: d.light sells $10-to-$25 solar-powered lamps in more than a dozen countries where people lack electricity and often spend a lot on kerosene, which gives off noxious fumes.

Five entrepreneurs are quietly lighting up the homes of millions who still have no access to electricity.

d.light, which manufactures and sells solar-powered lamps in poor areas of the globe, is an example of a company that seeks to bring entrepreneurship to a social mission.

"We’ve spent hundreds of hours in towns and villages in developing countries to find out what our customers need,” Ms Dorcas Cheng-Tozun, the communications director of d.light, says. It is no surprise that they want products that are durable, efficient, cheap to purchase and inexpensive to run.

The Shell Foundation has teamed up with d.light, a lighting and power company, to deliver affordable and high quality lighting solutions to rural households living without adequate electricity in India.

d.light, a lighting and power company, has joined hands with UK-based NGO Shell Foundation to deliver affordable and high quality lighting solutions to rural households living without adequate electricity in the country.

New Keringa is a model village in Southern Orissa, India, with 47 families. It is the first village in Orissa to be lit by solar energy, thanks to the unique joint initiative of d.light and Beyond Solar.

Sam Goldman and Ned Tozun first met while MBA students at Stanford University's Institute of Design, where they worked together on projects in a class called Designing for Extreme Affordability.

The mission of the Stanford class Entrepreneurial Design for Extreme Affordability: to teach a new generation of entrepreneurs to use their business and engineering smarts to design and sell products - profitably - for the developing world. Two such budding entrepreneurs are Nedjip Tozun and Sam Goldman, founders of d.light.

Harnessing a mix of creative thinking and engineering know-how, entrepreneurs have come up with a host of affordable, eco-friendly solutions to everyday problems ranging from cheaper solar panels in California to irrigation challenges for small farmers in Myanmar.

It used to be that people who wanted to solve a social problem - like lack of access to clean water or inadequate housing for the poor - created a charity. Today, many start a company instead. d.light, a company cofounded by Sam Goldman, is an example.

Sam Goldman and Ned Tozun are hard at work figuring out how to bring light to the more than 1.5 billion in this world without it. In 2006, Sam, now the CEO, and Ned, the President, founded d.light with the assistance of classmates in an entrepreneurship class at Stanford’s Graduate School of Business.

Start-ups backed by angel funds and networks are becoming popular with venture capitalist (VCs) for first-round, or so-called Series A, funding. Angel funds and investors, entrants to the Indian start-up landscape in the last couple of years, back start-ups with initial funding that usually helps managements of such firms to begin operations.

d.light, a company started in Silicon Valley and now resident in New Delhi, India, has a mission to replace toxic kerosene lighting for developing world villagers with solar-powered LEDs.

Acumen Fund, a social venture fund that invests in sustainable, scalable businesses that provide affordable healthcare, water, housing, and energy services to underserved households in South Asia and Africa, announced today the following new investments as part of its expanding energy portfolio in India.

Deploying clean tech solutions like solar or bio-gas power in rural areas sounds more like a government welfare scheme or an NGO programme. But now entrepreneurs are jumping in as they see a business opportunity.

This post is being written without lights. That’s a decision made because of where I am in western Canada and the time of day this is being written. But electricity isn’t so abundant everywhere in the world.

About 1.6 billion people still rely on kerosene lanterns to read, work or study after dark, according to a fledgling company that hopes its LED lights will replace those lanterns, eliminating both pollution and fires.

Billions of people continue to burn dangerous and costly kerosene in lamps to see at night. Start-up d.light, which aims for no less than to eliminate kerosene around the world within a decade.

Rural India is the new developmental marketplace as some new age entrepreneurs fueled by venture funds take it upon themselves to shed some light on the India that still survives without electricity.

Some 1.6 billion people around the world live without access to regular electricity. A start-up company founded by some ambitious recent graduates of Stanford Business School aims to ease that problem--and make a profit at the same time.

Designing sustainable products for the consumer that spends just $2 a day can be a dual challenge: The goods have to be cheap and eco-friendly.

Startup d.light wants to give customers in developing countries a safe, cheap and modern-day lighting solution to the kerosene lantern.

A San Francisco-based company with plans to help the developing world snuff out its kerosene-burning lamps and replace them with cheap, solar-powered LEDs and compact fluorescents has finally unveiled its production models and announced the details of its for-profit business plan.