CIM Group pours USD 40m into Israeli solar panel cleaning firm Ecoppia

Ecoppia, the Israeli provider of water-free solar panel cleaning robots, has secured a USD-40-million (EUR 34.9m) financing commitment from US real assets owner, developer and lender CIM Group.

The capital infusion has made CIM the largest investor in Ecoppia, the Israeli firm announced on Tuesday. It explained that the investment will enable it to significantly improve its balance sheet and lower its cost of debt.

"This capital infusion will allow Ecoppia to continue its geographic expansion, as more and more regions realize the benefits of shifting to robotic cleaning. It will also enable us to accelerate our innovative developments towards fully data-driven, automation-based solar O&M,” said Jean Scemama, Ecoppia’s CEO.

The Ecoppia water-free robots clean solar panels without human interference and are remotely managed through a cloud-based control system. Among the company’s tier-1 energy clients are France’s Engie (EPA:ENGI), EDF (EPA:EDF), Finnish utility Fortum Oyj (HEL:FORTUM), private equity firm Actis and others.

Ecoppia says it has more than 17 GW of secured projects, over 10 GW of which were received over the last three quarters.

(USD 1.0 = EUR 0.874)

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