Microgrid startup Go Electric secured a rare cleantech hardware exit when acquired by battery maker Saft this week.
The Indiana-based startup builds a compact microgrid controller, promising seamless backup power and integration with many types of energy devices. It made a name for itself when it met the Pentagon’s high bar for durable grid infrastructure, and has delivered four microgrid controllers to military bases and won contracts for three mobile systems.
Go Electric also branched into the commercial and industrial market in late 2017, chasing customers with resilience needs that could benefit from localized energy control, though that market has been slower to develop than its military applications.
The working relationship between acquirer and acquiree goes back three years, Go Electric CEO Lisa Laughner said in an interview at Greentech Media’s Grid Edge Innovation Summit this week.
Saft, the century-old manufacturer acquired by French energy major Total in 2016 for more than $1 billion, supplied batteries to Go Electric. Saft operates several factories in the U.S., including a 235,000 square-foot facility in Jacksonville, Florida, making its products compliant with the Buy American Act that governs federal procurements.
“Having Saft as our owner now gets rid of the startup stigma,” Laughner said. “Customers that might have been a little bit leery working with a startup company now don’t have to worry about that, because we’ve got the balance sheet of Saft — and Total, for that matter.”
The deal also expands Saft’s scope of operations in the grid edge market. Instead of just supplying batteries, like it did recently for a remote microgrid in an Alaskan salmon-fishing community, Saft can now sell power electronics and microgrid controls alongside its core product.
“This is right in line with what Total’s competitors are doing, getting into the C&I space and getting one more piece of that value chain,” said Elta Kolo, research manager for grid edge at Wood Mackenzie Power & Renewables.
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