Solar Energy Startup SOLshare Raises US$1.66M To Improve Access To Clean Energy For Rural Bangladesh

SOLshare, the Dhaka-based solar energy company that enables P2P electricity trading, has raised a US$1.66M investment in series A led by IIX Growth Fund, a Singapore-based organization that seeks to support high-impact enterprises, according to a report from Singapore based Deal Street Asia. The other investors participated in the round are Silicon Valley-based Innogy New Ventures LLC (the venture capital investment arm of the German utility firm Innogy SE), and Portuguese utility firm EDP.

SOLshare plans to use the fund to expand its operation, increase access to clean energy for over 19,000 rural households and 14,000 micro-entrepreneurs in Bangladesh.

What you need to know:

• SOLshare, founded in 2015 by Sebastian Groh, enables customers to produce, trade, and consume solar energy using a local microgrid. It has developed a peer to peer solar electricity trading platform that allows customers to sell their excess energy.
• It uses an internally developed energy meter connected to solar panels called SOLbox that enables electricity trading between households and micro-enterprises
• Bangladesh has five million solar home systems installed, SOLshare told Deal Street Asia. More than half of the country’s population has no access to electricity, and demand has reached nearly double the country’s generating capacity.
• This offers an incredible opportunity for companies like SOLshare to grow and build a business at scale.

Sebastian Groh, Managing Director of SOLshare told Deal Street Asia that SOLshare’s aim is to create efficient and dynamic local energy markets that empower households and encourage solar entrepreneurship. After Bangladesh, the startup aims to replicate the model in India, and eventually go global.