AutoGrid Pulls In $32M Series D

AutoGrid, the leader in artificial intelligence (AI)-driven optimization and controls for the energy industry, announced today that it has closed on a Series D investment round from a set of strategic energy investors.

AutoGrid's round of $32 million represents the largest infusion to date in any pure-play software platform focused on applying AI to real-time optimization and controls of flexible energy resources. With this round, the company has raised a total of $75 million to accelerate growth and further increase its product differentiation.

The round is led by a global consortium of energy companies, allowing AutoGrid to accelerate commercial deployment of the AutoGrid Flex™ platform across North America, Europe and Asia-Pacific. This consortium includes seven of the 10 largest utilities in North America, serves over 100 million customers globally and represents $1 trillion in total market capitalization.

New investors in this round include CLP Holdings Group, innogy, Orstead, Tenaska and others:
CLP was founded in Hong Kong in 1901, at a time when electricity was still a novelty worldwide. Today CLP powers millions of homes and businesses across the Asia-Pacific regions.
innogy, one of the largest European utilities, serving over 23 million customers, with headquarters in Germany.
Orsted, Danish renewable power developer, formerly known as DONG Energy, one of the largest offshore wind and renewable developers in the world.
Tenaska, one of the leading independent power producers in the United States, with more than 10,000 megawatts of power generation developed.

All existing investors – including Energy Impact Partners, Envision Ventures, Total Energy Ventures, Clearsky Power & Technology Fund, E.ON and Foundation Capital – also participated in the round.

"At CLP we believe that energy flow is no longer a one-way transaction. By partnering with AutoGrid, we are learning to turn flexible energy resources into balanced real-time energy services. We're increasing productivity and value of our energy assets and unlocking the possibility of exciting new digital energy services for our customers," said Austin R Bryan, senior director of innovation & ventures at CLP. "AutoGrid's platform enables a deeper understanding of the grid, delivering increased support to customers and ultimately giving them more choice and control. CLP is pleased to be a strategic investor and partner with AutoGrid."

"AutoGrid leads worldwide in applying AI and big data technologies to the energy value-chain," said Florian Kolb, managing director at innogy New Ventures. "Their unique platform meets our current and future innovation requirements to develop our regulated and deregulated businesses further."

These new partnerships come with commercial projects that will shape the future of the energy industry, redefine European and Asian markets, and demonstrate the importance of flexibility management as a core competency for successful energy companies.

"Electricity is the energy of the 21st century. It's our belief that the transition to a new, clean energy world will be enabled through digital technologies such as artificial intelligence, big data and IoT," said Girish Nadkarni, president of Total Energy Ventures. "AutoGrid has clearly established itself as the industry leader in this space and our partnership with them will help shape the future of new energy."

AutoGrid continues to hire aggressively in energy, AI, big data and Internet of Things (IoT) areas to develop capacity to manage increasingly larger-scale and complex grid modernization and digital transformation projects across the globe. AutoGrid is experiencing rapid growth and is on track to contract over 5,000 MW of flexible resources on its platform before the end of 2018, representing a compound annual growth rate of over 100 percent for each of the last three years.

"We are humbled by the trust and responsibility that some of the largest energy companies in the world are placing in us in their transformative journey towards a new energy future," said Dr. Amit Narayan, AutoGrid chief executive officer. "We are excited by the opportunity this investment gives us to drive forward our mission of accelerating the world's transition to clean, affordable and reliable energy."

About CLP Holding Group:
In Hong Kong, we operate a vertically-integrated electricity supply business providing a highly-reliable supply of electricity to 80% of the city's population. Outside Hong Kong, we invest in the energy sector in Mainland China, India, Southeast Asia, Taiwan and Australia. Our business includes power generation, transmission and distribution, and electricity and gas retail activities.

About innogy:
innogy SE is Germany's leading energy provider, but conducts activity in 16 countries across Europe. The company's key markets are Germany, the United Kingdom, the Netherlands and Belgium, as well as several countries in Central Eastern and South Eastern Europe, particularly the Czech Republic, Hungary and Poland.

About Orsted:
Orsted has a vision of creating a world that runs entirely on green energy. Ørsted develops, constructs and operates offshore wind farms, bioenergy plants and innovative waste-to-energy solutions and provides smart energy products to its customers. Headquartered in Denmark, Orsted employs 5,600 people. Ørsted's shares are listed on Nasdaq Copenhagen (Orsted). In 2017, the company's revenue was DKK 59.5 billion (EUR 8.0 billion).

About Tenaska:
Tenaska, based in Omaha, Nebraska, is one of the leading independent power producers in the United States. Forbes magazine ranks Tenaska among the largest privately held U.S. companies. Tenaska and its affiliates have developed approximately 10,000 megawatts (MW) of natural gas-fueled and renewable power generation and manage operations for approximately 7,000 MW of power generation consisting of nine power plants. Affiliate Tenaska Marketing Ventures is one of the top five natural gas marketers in North America, with 9.5 billion cubic feet of natural gas sold or managed in 2017, accounting for 10 percent of U.S./Canada gas consumption. Affiliate Tenaska Power Services Co., with more than 58,000 megawatts under management, is a leading third-party provider of energy management services. For more information about Tenaska, visit www.tenaska.com.

About Total Energy Ventures:
Total Energy Ventures is Total's venture capital arm for investing in energy start-ups. Its investments support the development of innovative businesses in areas such as renewable energies, energy efficiency, energy storage, digital energy and sustainable transportation.

About AutoGrid:
AutoGrid builds software applications that utilize artificial intelligence, machine learning, big data and IoT technologies to enable a smarter and cleaner distributed energy world. The company's suite of flexibility management applications allows utilities, electricity retailers, renewable energy project developers and energy service providers to deliver clean, affordable and reliable energy by managing networked distributed energy resources (DERs) in real time and at scale. AutoGrid has more than 3,500 megawatts of flexible capacity from DERs under contract and its customer list includes National Grid, NextEra Energy, E.ON, Total, Xcel Energy, China Light and Power and over 30 other leading global energy companies around the world.