Deal focus: PE lights up CleanMax’s global plans

Kuldeep Jain had plenty to be proud of. CleanMax Solar, the company that he founded in 2011, had taken a commanding position in India’s rooftop solar pan installation market. For the last three years Jain had watched as competitors battled for the number two spot – safe in the knowledge that CleanMax’s market share consistently hovered around 25%, greater than that of the second and third place combined.

But while leading the competitive Indian rooftop solar market was a badge of honor, Jain knew his company could go further still – and his corporate clients were more than happy to provide him the opportunity. “We have a lot of global leaders and multinational companies as clients who often tell us, ‘You’ve done a fantastic job for us in India, and we also have facilities in the Middle East and Southeast Asia – could we do something about that?’” Jain says.

The company took the first step toward internationalization on its own – now a new investment of $100 million from Warburg Pincus is meant to give CleanMax the resources it needs to keep building momentum.

The company’s existing customers are the foundation for its nascent global expansion. Since its founding, CleanMax has focused on the corporate market rather than on public utilities, promising to help clients meet their sustainability goals. While the majority of its work is in rooftop solar installations, it has also built larger solar farms to provide energy to customers on an open access basis. Jain is confident the knowledge and experience CleanMax has built up in these areas in the past six years will transfer into new markets.

“A lot of the skillsets are quite common, and therefore it does make sense to go international with the same clients, and be slightly client-led in our internationalization strategy,” he explains. “So we began three or four months ago in Dubai, and we intend to use that as a springboard for other Middle East markets in time.”

In addition to the international expansion plans, Warburg Pincus’ investment is also intended to help CleanMax add a new vertical to its business focused on energy storage. This is intended to address a serious concern that has always caused difficulty for the renewable energy industry: the inconsistency of energy supply. CleanMax will provide clients with solutions for storing excess solar energy for use when sunlight is not available.

Such a business line might seem a risky leap for a company that made its name as a solar power provider. But Jain sees it as a logical and necessary part of the long-term plan to make CleanMax synonymous with sustainability in India and around the world.

“If you want to be a company’s sustainability partner of choice, I think a massive difference can be made if one can store renewable energy,” Jain says. “It’s not a completely new venture for us, it’s really additional products that help in meeting our mission of being that sustainability partner.”

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• Topics
• South Asia
• Cleantech
• Infrastructure
• India
• Warburg Pincus Asia
• energy
• Growth capital