A U.S.-based solar device company, Greenlight Planet, has launched solar chargers that it plans to use to light up the world’s darkest continent — Africa.

It is estimated that more than 80 percent of Africa’s population of nearly 1 billion people lacks access to clean lighting and most depend on kerosene lamps and firewood. The pollution is considered as dangerous as cigarette smoke.

The Chicago-based company produces solar-powered lamps geared toward disadvantaged rural communities. Since launching in 2009, the startup has sold 1.8 million lamps costing between $11 and $40 — the equivalent of about two weeks wages in many rural communities. One million lamps were sold in the last 10 months alone, CNNMoney reported.

Greenlight Planet has now launched two solar chargers, Sun King Mobile and Sun King Pro2, that is plans to retail for $30, targeting Kenya, Ethiopia, Uganda, Rwanda, Tanzania, Nigeria, Zimbabwe, Mozambique, Zambia, South Africa and the Central African Republic in its first roll out.

The two products are charged by sunlight and provide up to 30 hours of energy use, meaning they can comfortably light a house through the night.

“Mobile connectivity remains a crucial lifeline in rural communities across Africa, providing banking, healthcare and employment services for users. Yet, often individuals must walk 10 kilometers to electrified shops and pay steep fees to charge their phone,” IT Web Africa quoted Anish Thakkar, company chief executive officer saying during the launch.

The company said it plans to recruit over 3,000 Sun King business associates in both Kenya and Uganda to sell the products directly to the consumers who are not on the national electricity grid. The initiative is also planned to kick-start this March.

Greenlight Planet operates in nine countries and says it has over 6,000 Sun King business executives in those countries.

Social Mission With A Profit

Despite it clear social mission the company is ran as a profit organization and recently became profitable and logged $20 million in revenue in 2013. It projects 4 million lamps will be sold this year and hopes to be in 16 million homes by 2016.

“Because consumers pay for our products, rather than receive them through charity, [our] products must add real value and stand up to the rigors of the marketplace,” Patrick Walsh, the founding partner of the company, explained its business model to CNNMoney.

Walsh came up with the idea for a socially driven energy company in 2005 while working with Engineers Without Borders in India. There, he saw firsthand the risks associated with kerosene lamps.

Within several years, he’d teamed up with two former University of Illinois classmates, raised $600,000 in seed funding and launched Greenlight Planet. In 2009, they sold 10,000 lamps in India. By 2012, sales jumped to more than 600,000.

During that period, the company also raised financing from Deutsche Bank and secured an additional $4 million in funding from private investors.