SolarSquare has raised $40 million in what’s the largest enterprise spherical in India’s photo voltaic sector.
The Mumbai-based startup bootstrapped and was worthwhile promoting to company prospects for 5 years earlier than switching to residential photo voltaic in 2021. Now it has scaled to powering over 20,000 properties and 200 housing societies throughout India, and is India’s largest operator of distributed photo voltaic belongings.
“That is the chance of a lifetime,” Shreya Mishra, co-founder and chief government of SolarSquare, informed TechCrunch in an interview. “It’s not simply an trade that’s rising superfast — it’s the place revenue and objective align.”
Not like others within the area, SolarSquare ensures returns on photo voltaic investments and compensates prospects if methods don’t ship, making its full-stack service — promoting the methods, putting in them to the buyer’s rooftop, and providing after-sales providers — far more compelling. The general value of shopping for and having the system put in averages about $1,500.
“If we promise you’ll get 5,000 models of electrical energy from photo voltaic however you find yourself getting solely 4,000 models, we pays you again for the stability 1,000 models,” Mishra stated. “This makes photo voltaic like a set deposit for purchasers as a result of return on funding is assured.”
Because of latest incentives offered by the federal government, photo voltaic curiosity has surged lately. The push is critical as solely about 1% of Indian properties have at the moment adopted photo voltaic, in comparison with nations like Australia, the place 35% properties have photo voltaic, and Brazil, the place greater than 5% properties have photo voltaic.
“Two years again, folks solely had textbook data — they discovered at school that photo voltaic is one thing good,” Mishra stated. “They didn’t know the way a lot it value, they didn’t find out about authorities subsidies, they didn’t know that the payback interval is actually 4 to five years.”
India has set an formidable goal of attaining 500 gigawatts of renewable power capability by 2030, with solar energy anticipated to contribute about 280 gigawatts to this objective. To speed up photo voltaic adoption, Modi’s authorities has launched a number of incentives, together with a production-linked incentive scheme value $3 billion to spice up home photo voltaic manufacturing, 40% primary customs obligation on photo voltaic modules to guard native trade, and viability hole funding for utilities to construct photo voltaic infrastructure in distant areas.
The federal government additionally affords accelerated depreciation advantages, revenue tax holidays for photo voltaic tasks, and capital subsidies starting from 20% to 70% for rooftop photo voltaic installations, whereas additionally mandating renewable buy obligations for state utilities to make sure regular demand for solar energy. SolarSquare helps its prospects determine and avail the advantages of the federal government subsidies, Mishra stated.
“India is the primary nation on this planet to make net-metering, this change of electrical energy, a shopper proper that makes economics extra viable as you’re capable of freely commerce electrical energy with the grid,” she stated.
The demand for photo voltaic is slowly extending effectively past main cities. “Not like quick-commerce or companies that target prime 10-15 cities, photo voltaic is definitely a nationwide, Bharat type of enterprise,” Mishra stated. “Individuals in Tier 1, Tier 2, Tier 3 cities in addition to rural India — all over the place there are properties, folks will need to go photo voltaic.”
SolarSquare will deploy the recent funds to increase from 20 to 50 cities, however is taking a cautious strategy. “As entrepreneurs, we’re not in a enterprise of ‘transfer quick and break issues,’” she stated. “Whenever you’re doing a critical product like photo voltaic, enjoying with folks’s life and security, there needs to be that quantity of seriousness.”
For smaller cities, the startup plans to work with native companions whereas sustaining high quality management.
The timing works in SolarSquare’s favor. India has made net-metering a shopper proper and minimize down allow processing from months to days.
Lightspeed led the funding, a Sequence B financing spherical, with Lightrock becoming a member of, alongside current traders Elevation Capital, Chris Sacca’s Lowercarbon, and Nithin Kamath’s Rainmatter. The startup, which had raised $19.5 million beforehand, will even put money into know-how to construct higher methods for monitoring and managing residential photo voltaic installations remotely.
