AI-driven Cloud-based Platform and Solar Panel Innovator: Big Winners at PowerACE 2020!

Twelve international finalists squared off at the PowerACE Pitching Competition on 28 October, at the Asia Clean Energy Summit 2020. Clean energy start-ups Bird’s Eye Energy won the “PFAN Impact Award”, and Resync Technologies bagged the “ECOLABS Special Award.”

The PowerACE Pitching Competition is organized annually by the Sustainable Energy Association of Singapore (SEAS) in partnership with the Private Advisory Financing Network (PFAN), and the ECOLABS Center of Innovation for Energy. Now in its third year, and for the first time in a virtual format, PowerACE provides early-stage companies in the energy sector the opportunity to scale up their start-ups by pitching their business to a broad range of clean energy experts, technologists, and investors attending the Asia Clean Energy Summit.

The competition attracted more than 60 start-ups from Asia and around the world, and the 12 finalists offered business solutions covering everything from e-mobility and batteries, to peer-to-peer trading on grids and between village solar home systems, optimization of energy planning, PV panel regeneration and reutilization, and AI-based solutions for detecting leaks and faults in electricity transmission systems and gas and water pipelines.

“As judges, we were extremely impressed this year by the high quality and technical depth of all 12 pitches,” said Dr. Peter du Pont, PFAN Asia Regional Coordinator and one of the three judges for the competition. “These start-ups have brought a wealth of experience and technical depth to their solutions, and they are bringing creative, disruptive, and bankable business propositions to the Asian energy market.”

Kavita Gandhi, Executive Director, SEAS, said: “Over the past three years, PowerACE competition supported by Enterprise Singapore (ESG) has helped to accelerate the growth of local clean energy start-ups by providing a platform to showcase them to investors, large corporations as well as R&D institutions in Singapore. This will contribute to the national ambition of net zero emissions by 2050”.

Resync Technologies, the winner of the ECOLABS Special Award, worth SGD 100,000, is a Singaporean start-up that has developed an AI-driven cloud-based platform for managing energy across a variety of areas, including renewable assets, smart buildings, telcom towers, EVs and mobility and microgrids. Bird’s Eye Energy, of India, received the PFAN Impact Award, worth SGD 13,000, for their innovative 2-in-1 Solar Panels solution, which provides both hot water and electricity.

For six weeks leading up to the competition, PFAN, IOTA Omega Ventures, New Energy Nexus, ENRUPT and ENGIE Factory Asia Pacific provided the finalists with coaching services to help the startups refine their business models and fine-tune their investment pitches. The coaching is aimed at helping the startups succeed during and after the competition.

For more information about the event, or the companies, contact David Yeo, PFAN Regional Transaction Manager in Singapore (david.yeo@pfan.net).