Amsterdam, Netherlands, October 12, 2023: Rockstart, global early stage VC and accelerator, announces its co-investment in Circadian, a Rockstart Energy portfolio company. The €1.25m round was led by BayWa r.e. Energy Ventures alongside Rockstart, Persistent Energy Capital, Great Stuff Ventures, Tofino Capital, and Ralicap Climate. The startup plans to use the funding to expand its SaaS data platform functionality and scale up operations to immediate demand.
The Berlin-based startup has developed an Energy Management System hardware and Software as a Service (SaaS) solution for solar developers and asset owners, particularly in grid-challenged emerging market countries in Africa. Thanks to their all-in-one solution platform, the entire project value chain, from site assessment and design to commissioning and asset management, can be optimized. Circadian helps C&I companies to adopt renewable energy systems in place of diesel generators, starting with telecom tower companies across the continent, driving forward decarbonization on a significant scale. The team strives to become the leading B2B platform for Distributed Energy Resources (DER) in emerging markets.
We want to empower renewable energy installers and strive to be the catalyst for the mass adoption of decentralized energy in growth markets. Circadian is currently scaling across Africa, where we want to extend the team, build out the platform’s functionalities, and drive further growth. The backing of our investors will be a tremendous help for this.Mike Rosenberg, CEO, Circadian
With their innovative technology, Circadian facilitates solar micro grids for companies in emerging markets, making an important contribution towards decarbonization. This is our first investment on the African continent, and we are excited to see more opportunities from companies looking to accelerate energy transition in the region.Greg Zavorotniy, Managing Director, BayWa r.e. Energy Ventures
We see Circadian as a perfect example of an ecosystem player and enabler: they are filling a significant gap in the C&I solar space that we believe will help the whole sector scale faster and increase the rate at which renewable, solar energy replaces diesel generators and other sources of dirty energy. Their offering is particularly attractive for solarizing TelCo towers and thus, this is also an exciting and growing space that our investment in Circadian will give us further insights into.Tobias Ruckstuhl, Managing Partner, Persistent Energy
Telecom tower companies and C&I customers in emerging and established markets want to reduce their diesel generator consumption by implementing renewable-powered microgrids. Circadian supports them with a hardware and SaaS platform that turns complex projects into plug-and-play solutions. In this way, the company greatly enables the scaling of renewable energy use among customers. We are thrilled to participate in this funding round, led by BayWa r.e. Energy Ventures, which will enable Circadian to expand its business even further.Max ter Horst, Managing Partner, Rockstar Energy
Since 2014, Rockstart has been accelerating and investing in energy startups, which makes Rockstart a forerunner in the energy domain with 75 early-stage startup investments. Collectively, these portfolio companies have raised over €150 million to date. Rockstart Energy invests in and accelerates startups at the pre-seed stage and continues to support them alongside other investors until series B. On average, Rockstart invests in approximately 12 energy startups per year.
Circadian empowers solar developers to win more projects, reduce operating costs and grow revenue with its SaaS platform and proprietary IoT hardware. The company was founded by Mike Rosenberg and Max Boit who have extensive experience in the African markets. Circadian is on a mission to decarbonize Africa’s business growth by empowering solar companies. For more information, please visit Circadian’s website.
About Rockstart
Rockstart is an early stage investor that empowers purpose-driven founders across three domains: Energy, AgriFood, and Emerging Technologies.
Rockstart invests in early-stage startups from each of the three funds and provides access to capital, market, and expertise by connecting founders with co-investors, mentors, partners, corporates, and the wider Rockstart network.
Rockstart has invested in more than 350 startups and its alumni value to date is more than €1.7bn. Rockstart is an international team of 45+ professionals dedicated to empowering purpose-driven founders to become scalable and drive positive change on a global scale. Rockstart has notable exits such asWercker, Dan.com, Hubs.Com, Bouw7, iClinic, and s and Brincr. The company has offices in Amsterdam, Copenhagen, and Bogota.
Contact details
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- Felipe Santamaria
- Managing Director, Rockstart LatAm
- felipe@rockstart.com
- +57 318 3866940
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