Fourth Partner Energy, a distributed energy management company, raised a $70 million investment from The Rise Fund, a global impact investment fund managed by TPG Growth. Investec acted as the advisor to this transaction for Fourth Partner Energy, with KPMG and Shardul Amarchand Mangaldas providing diligence and legal advisory to The Rise Fund and TPG Growth.

Fourth Partner Energy will use this investment to strengthen its position in this emerging sector and accelerate its growth through the RESCO model across industrial and commercial corporate and public-sector clients.

It will also allow Fourth Partner Energy to expand its basket of distributed energy management solutions to its customers and expand operations to other geographies including South East Asia, the Middle East and Africa.

“India is demonstrating to the world the positive commercial and environmental impact of distributed solar solutions. Across industries, our customers are realizing tangible savings in their power bills. By replacing traditional thermal power plants with renewable energy sources, we are helping nurture the critical ecosystem in India. We are now confident of exceeding our initial target of managing over 1 GW of distributed solar assets by 2022 through this strategic partnership with The Rise Fund and TPG Growth,” said Vivek Subramanian, the founder of Fourth Partner Energy.

“We believe that The Rise Fund and TPG Growth’s global positioning, deep corporate connections and a long-term commitment to this space will ensure that we become the partner of choice for our customers across the region. We are grateful to our committed workforce of over 170 employees across India and to The Chennai Angels and Infuse Ventures for their strong faith in our vision and their support early in the life cycle of the company,” added Vivek.

According to the latest report released by Mercom India Research – India Solar Market Leaderboard 2017, Fourth Partner Energy was the third largest rooftop solar PV installer in India in 2017. Rooftop installations are currently dependent on government projects followed by commercial and industrial (C&I) installations. Residential rooftop market is still very small with hordes of inexperienced small installers vying for that segment leading to questionable build quality. Subsidy disbursement delays by the government to residential installers has affected installation growth.