In many rental properties in Dar es Salaam, electricity bills are split equally between tenants who rent individual rooms within one rental property. Smart Luku enables individual tenants to track their electricity consumption and pay their fair share.
Shabo’s story
Shabo Andrew, an IoT Engineer and entrepreneur with a degree in Telecommunications from the University of Dar es Salaam, is revolutionising electricity management in rental properties with his innovative smart meter, Smart Luku. Inspired by his own struggles as a student in a shared rental house, Shabo set out to develop a solution that ensures tenants pay only for the electricity they use.
The innovation
In many rental property buildings, a single electricity meter is shared by all tenants, requiring them to split the total bill – even if some have used significantly more energy than others. This often leads to disputes and, in some cases, unpaid bills that result in power cut-offs for the entire building.
Smart Luku solves this issue by using IoT technology to track electricity consumption for up to 64 tenants. A single device is installed in place of a building’s existing electricity meter, usually located on the outside of the building. Unlike a traditional meter that only tracks the total energy consumption of a building, Smart Luku detects and measures multiple channels using current transformer sensors. Each tenant is assigned a dedicated channel that separately monitors their electricity usage. The system then processes this data and enables individual billing, ensuring accurate tracking for each rental unit.
As a student, I struggled with unfair shared electricity bills. Some used more, but we all had to split the cost. I created Smart Luku to ensure tenants only pay for what they use, eliminating disputes, simplifying billing, and preventing power cut-offs. I applied to the Africa Prize to gain mentorship, funding and exposure to make Smart Luku ready for production and scale the innovation across Africa.
The device determines each individual rental property’s energy usage. The energy meter then connects to local servers which connect to the Smart Luku app, where data is processed in real time and tenants can monitor their own electricity usage in a mobile app. Tenants buy electricity units (named LUKU in Tanzania) in advance, with the app alerting the user when the credits are low and allowing them to top up.
An innovative feature of the app is also the ability to borrow and lend power credits. Tenants within the same building can request and lend LUKU units to one another. When a tenant requests units from a neighbour, they receive the amount needed and automatically return it upon their next LUKU purchase. This feature was introduced after observing how Tanzanians often assist each other when alternatives are unavailable.
Making a difference
Smart Luku is a practical solution that directly addresses the issue of shared electricity bills – a common source of conflict in rental buildings in Dar es Salaam. Each tenant is responsible for and can monitor and regulate their own usage ensuring a fair and transparent system and potentially reducing individual electricity usage and spend.
Having successfully built a prototype, Shabo now aims to scale the product to reach 1,000 customers within the first year, empowering both tenants and landlords with a smarter, more efficient, and fairer way to manage electricity use.
