Need a sneak peek on the electrical grid of the longer term? Don’t look to the U.S., Europe or China. As a substitute, head to Nigeria, where Odyssey Energy Solutions has been hard at work. There, a shaky and incomplete grid has driven many businesses and communities to take a position in mini- and microgrids which might be powered by renewable energy and able to running independently.
Odyssey has been constructing a platform to assist developers launch, construct and manage distributed renewable energy projects in emerging markets like Nigeria, Kenya and Sierra Leone. Those efforts helped the corporate raise a $5.3 million seed round last summer.
Now, just seven months later, Odyssey has closed a $15 million Series A, TechCrunch+ has exclusively learned. The round was led by Union Square Ventures, with participation from Equal Ventures, Twelve Below, Transition, Equator, MCJ Collective, Abstract Ventures, Founder Collective and Climate Capital.
The corporate collects data on each project that flows through its platform, which it then uses to assist investors vet future projects. A few of that data also helps developers procure equipment for his or her projects, be it solar panels, inverters or other key supplies. And on the tail end, Odyssey has software to regulate the energy flowing through developers’ mini- and microgrids.
When the corporate raised its seed round last yr, business was good. Odyssey co-founder and CEO Emily McAteer told TechCrunch+ that her company had already built up a network of project developers and had a major amount of capital in its goal markets flowing through the platform. Its software products were also helping developers procure supplies for less and more easily manage the mini- and microgrids that that they had built. On the time, raising a Series A briefly order wasn’t within the cards.
But that modified within the months that followed. “We had some proof points that we desired to hit in launching those products, and we kind of hit them in a short time,” McAteer said. Some key hires also helped them rapidly understand another pain points that Odyssey customers often experience. McAteer referred to this mixture of team and product as “a springboard.”
