SolarEdge reported record revenues and profitability for the first quarter of 2018 on Wednesday — along with plans to move into markets beyond solar power optimization.
On the energy storage front, SolarEdge announced an $11.5 million acquisition of Gamatronic Electronic Industries Ltd., an uninterruptible power supply (UPS) systems provider for commercial and industrial businesses around the world. CEO Guy Sella noted that the acquisition is the second major step for the company outside the solar arena, the first being last year’s launch of inverter-embedded electric vehicle charging systems.
Another came last week, with SolarEdge’s launch of a cloud-based virtual power plant management system, one that could turn its fleet of solar optimizers and inverters into nodes of a distributed energy resource control platform.
Last week’s launch marks the debut of a system that’s already controlling homes in projects in three countries, said Lior Handelsman, co-founder and vice president of marketing and product strategy, in a Monday interview.
In Vermont, utility Green Mountain Power is tapping SolarEdge’s capabilities to manage a small but growing fleet of smart homes equipped with Tesla Powerwall batteries, grid-controllable water heaters, Nest thermostats, and smart EV chargers, he said. In the Netherlands, utility Eneco is using the company’s platform for its CrowdNett home battery offering.
In Australia, utility AGL picked SolarEdge, along with Tesla and LG, to roll out its long-awaited residential VPP project, said Handelsman.
These projects are all using SolarEdge’s inverters as the home’s central control point for solar panels, batteries and electric vehicle chargers — constantly updating battery status, solar power output status, household load and other key data, he said. But they also serve as the end node for a cloud-based platform that orchestrates their operation in aggregate.
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