Sandra Chukwudozie

Founder & CEO Salpha Energy

Last Reviewed: September 25, 2026

Executive Summary

Sandra Chukwudozie is the founder and chief executive of Salpha Energy, a Nigerian company that designs, assembles and distributes solar home systems for households and small businesses that have no reliable connection to the grid. She started the company in 2017 after working in sustainable development at the United Nations, and has built it around local manufacturing: Salpha runs a solar assembly plant in Calabar, Cross River State, which the World Bank has highlighted for employing large numbers of young women. Her argument is commercial as much as developmental — that off-grid solar is often the cheapest and fastest way to electrify Nigerian homes, and that Africa should produce these systems rather than only import them.

Career Highlights

• Founded Salpha Energy in 2017 and leads it as CEO.
• Established the Salpha Solar Assembly Plant in Calabar with support from the World Bank-funded Nigeria Electrification Project; the World Bank describes an assembly line staffed largely by young women, many of them in their first job.
• In 2021, Salpha qualified for an output-based grant under the Nigeria Electrification Project and raised US$1 million from All On, the Shell-backed impact investor.
• Named to Forbes Africa’s 30 Under 30 class of 2022 in the energy category, as reported by BusinessDay and Glamour South Africa.
• Previously a sustainable development consultant with the United Nations Industrial Development Organization, focused on clean energy and energy efficiency, and worked in the General Assembly and ECOSOC Affairs Division at UN Headquarters.

Professional Journey

Chukwudozie studied economics and political science at the University of Manchester and began her career at the United Nations. At the United Nations Industrial Development Organization she worked as a sustainable development consultant on clean energy and energy efficiency in industrial development for developing countries, and at UN Headquarters she worked in the Office of the Director for the General Assembly and ECOSOC Affairs Division, supporting the office’s work on the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development.

She grew up in a family with substantial interests in Nigeria’s oil and gas industry, and has described founding Salpha as a deliberate choice to build something of her own rather than join the family business. She launched the company in 2017. The early problem, as she has told it, was trust: the Nigerian market had been flooded with cheap, substandard solar products, and Salpha’s answer was to design tiered solar home systems for specific income levels and to have its products certified under the World Bank-backed VeraSol quality framework. Distribution ran through a network of more than 500 sales agents, cooperatives and traders, with payment partners such as Paga and Interswitch making instalment purchases possible for customers with irregular income.

2021 was the year the business gained institutional backing. Salpha qualified for an output-based grant agreement under the Nigeria Electrification Project, the World Bank-funded programme to expand off-grid power, and secured US$1 million from All On, an impact investment company backed by Shell. The following year Forbes Africa named her to its 30 Under 30 class.

The company has since moved further into manufacturing. With support from the Nigeria Electrification Project, she built up the Salpha Solar Assembly Plant in Calabar, and a 2026 World Bank feature describes her expanding the factory and hiring more staff, with women who started as entry-level assemblers going on to become certified installers and sales agents. “We aim to shift the narrative of Africa from being mere consumers to becoming producers,” she told the World Bank. The product range now runs from entry-level lighting kits and solar fans to portable power stations and larger home systems with wall-mounted lithium batteries, and the company’s own site says its mission now reaches “over 2 million lives.” She has set Salpha a target of providing clean energy to 30 million people across Africa by 2030, through expansion into other West, East and Southern African markets.

Education

University of Manchester

Bachelor’s degree, Economics and Political Science