Tesla (NASDAQ: TSLA) has been the biggest global player in the nascent battery energy storage market in everything from residential to utility-scale projects. Its 129-megawatt-hour (MWh) project in Australia, which took less than 100 days to build, is currently the most public example of how energy storage can be deployed and create value in a short amount of time.
Partly because of Tesla’s success, companies from across the energy spectrum are eyeing the energy storage market. One that Tesla should fear is Fluence, the joint venture by Siemens (NASDAQOTH: SIEGY) and AES (NYSE: AES) that has leading energy storage technology and its own financing to build projects around the world.
Fluence launches in a big way
In early January, Fluence was officially launched after getting necessary government approvals. The company laid out its strategy like this: “Fluence combines the engineering, product development, implementation and services capabilities of AES Energy Storage and Siemens’ energy storage team and embarks on an aggressive expansion of the business backed by the financial support of the two parent organizations.”
Fluence already announced that it will build the world’s largest lithium-ion battery storage system, a 100 MW/400 MW-hr project built for AES’ Alamitos power plant in Long Beach, California. In total, the company has 500 MW of projects deployed or awarded in 15 countries.
Siemens said it will use its sales force to sell Fluence platforms for large and small installations. This will give the energy storage company a sales force that spans 160 countries and works with one of the key utility suppliers globally.
Siemens Financial Services will also be providing leasing and other project finance options for some Fluence projects. This could make it easier to build a sales channel, particularly when selling to commercial customers who may not be able to finance energy storage on their own.
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