As solar continues to boom companies from storage, software and other fields are attracted to the potential for success in the industry. At forum at Intersolar NA 2015, five new innovative companies spoke about becoming part of the solar revolution. Here’s a quick look at each.
kWH Analytics: Solar risk management
kWh Analytics helps the solar industry organize and learn from its data. It believes that creating asset transparency helps the industry to evolve into a well-understood, healthy, and massive asset class. The company enables solar asset owners to take control of their risk management and analytics with its software platform. The analytics are generated on the industry’s largest database of operating solar assets, encompassing 40,000+ PV systems and nearly 1 GW of capacity across all major U.S. markets. Clients include leading solar originators, financial institutions, and a State “Green Bank.”
PVComplete: Solar project design automation and optimization
PVComplete is a commercial solar rooftop design platform built to streamline the most time-consuming tasks. The software tool completely automates module layout using a cloud-based PV module database while observing roof zones and obstructions with sophisticated shadow models. PVComplete fully automates the electrical design as well by assigning modules to strings and determining wiring requirements. The software is seamlessly integrated with AutoCAD and can be delivered as a package simplifying the start-up process. The tool can save up to $500 on each design iteration, amounting to thousands of dollars savings in labor on monthly basis.
Savenia Solar Ratings: CARFAX for solar
Savenia Solar Ratings is a rating label like CarFax, but for home solar systems. The ratings are meant to help home sellers and buyers more easily understand and unlock the monetary value in solar systems with rating labels and marketing materials. They report solar system earnings and environmental impact by zip code. Since solar systems can add tens of thousands of dollars to the price of a home, these labels revolutionize shopping for solar-outfitted homes at a glance. Savenia has rated homes in 6 states, including the solar system on The White House. “We want to help installers increase their conversion rates and home owners capture the full value of their solar systems when selling,” said founder John Jabara.
UtilityAPI: Data Automation, proposals to customer management
UtilityAPI is is taking on a choke point in the solar customer acquisition process, the cumbersome and time-consuming process of getting utilities to cough up their customers’ energy usage and billing data. Today, that involves phone calls, authorization forms and long waiting periods, a gauntlet that can turn some customers away and add significant costs to serving those that do stick with it. This software delivers simple access to energy usage data. It aims to provide quick and accurate utility data to help decrease customer acquisition cost, which can make up roughly 10% of a residential solar system’s total cost. “We are building the data infrastructure for the new energy economy. we are automating getting the messy data out of the utilities and into the solar consultants hands so they can do their jobs from day one,” said CEO and co-founder Elena Lucas.
Solar Site Design: Reducing customer acquisition costs up to 50%
Solar Site Design is an app and online platform that connects highly-qualified solar project referrals to leading solar companies to drive down customer acquisition costs. Its business process is designed to reduce the solar industry’s customer acquisition costs by up to 50%. “Customer acquisition cost is a huge problem in our industry and we’re ready to attack it. We’re connecting the dots to get well-qualified leads and save everybody money. We’re empowering the next generation of independent solar agents nationwide,” said president and founder Jason Lovet.
