The Hague-based Solar Monkey, a solar panel software provider, announced on Monday that it is launching its software in the UK with the goal of increasing productivity for solar installers while accelerating the energy transition.
In order to finance its ongoing expansion and growing impact, the Dutch company raised €4M in growth capital in August 2022. The round was led by the Finnish investor Helen Ventures and the Dutch energy group Eneco, joining backers 4impact and Innovation Quarter.
What does Solar Monkey offer?
Founded in 2015 by Jan Pieter Versluijs, Tino de Bruijn and Mels van Hoolwerff, Solar Monkey was born from the belief that smart software can accelerate the solar energy market rapidly.
Solar Monkey aims to accelerate the solar energy transition with software that allows installers to work much more effectively and helps them save time on designing, quoting, and monitoring solar PV systems.
With 500,000 designs annually, the company claims to be the biggest supplier of PV installation software in the Netherlands, which has the largest home market in Europe (1,044 watts per capita, according to SolarPower Europe).
Expansion in the UK
Solar Monkey says they have hired Jasin Mahamud as its UK Sales Manager and is currently hiring additional people to support its worldwide expansion plans.
It is also strengthening UK marketing of its digital design and quote tools, which are targeted at enhancing the efficiency of Solar photovoltaic (PV) installers.
Customers are turning to rooftop power generation to save money on fuel costs and decrease greenhouse-gas emissions, creating unprecedented demand for installation expertise. Many installers are experiencing backlogs.
Previously, planning and bidding for a project took hours, with five quotes required and the majority of the work done by an engineer. The procedure takes minutes with Solar Monkey and can be completed by anybody, possibly resulting in productivity increases.
In order to save time on planning and quoting, Solar Monkey has enabled 1 million project designs and quotations, and is utilised in more than 250,000 PV systems in the Netherlands, Belgium, Spain, and Germany.
The company claims that its software is quick to use and simple to integrate, even for individuals without technical skills, because it is built on advanced algorithms, aerial photographs, and 3D models.
Installers can quadruple their production by spending less time on administrative tasks. Due to its independence, Solar Monkey’s software works with all popular panel, inverter and battery brands.
By using the company’s services and software, installers can precisely estimate and guarantee the clean energy output of their clients’ solar PV installations.
According to Jan Pieter Versluijs and Tino de Bruijn, the opportunity is proportionally greater in the UK where there were 556MW of installed solar PV capacity in the first half of 2022, an increase of 80 per cent over the same period in the previous year.
Versluijs says, “We’ve seen tremendous growth in solar in the UK and we believe this trend will accelerate. People are increasingly aware of the need to reduce CO2 emissions in response to climate change. Now, energy price rises driven by Russia’s actions are hitting hard.”
“The transition is well under way and increased efficiency plays a big part.”
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