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CDC Group infuses Rs 250 cr in Fourth Partner Energy

CDC’s facility will catalyse the growth of the sector by helping to accelerate the uptake of renewable energy by corporates at a quicker pace

CDC Group, the UK’s development finance institution (DFI) and impact investor, announced Rs 250 crore investment into Fourth Partner Energy, India’s leading solar energy company for commercial and industrial businesses.

The capital from CDC Group will be in the form of non-convertible debentures and Fourth Partner Energy will deploy this mezzanine capital towards growing its renewable solutions platform across India and South Asia, the company said in a statement. This marks CDC’s foray into India’s commercial and industrial solar segment and Fourth Partner Energy’s first major round of fund-raising in 2021.

“CDC’s investment will support India”s clean energy transition and enable the provision of cleaner energy to businesses. It will fund approximately 217 megawatts (MW) greenfield renewable power generation in India, to displace primarily thermal power generation, avoiding 258k tonnes of annual CO2 emissions,” the statement said.

CDC’s facility will catalyse the growth of the sector by helping to accelerate the uptake of renewable energy by corporates at a quicker pace. Srini Nagarajan, MD and head of Asia at CDC, said: “CDC is committed to making long-term investments alongside our investment partners, with a clear purpose to bolster efforts toward achieving a net-zero carbon future in India and across the region. We have been building scale in the renewable power sector and this investment into Fourth Partner Energy, on the distributed solar side of the sector, is a strategic investment that further enhances India”s renewable power capacity.”

Fourth Partner Energy manages a portfolio of 550 MW. It has commenced operations across Sri Lanka, Bangladesh and Vietnam. In Indonesia, it has tied up with integrated energy major Indika Energy to offer solar solutions to corporates there.

On the company’s growth plans, Vivek Subramanian, co-founder and executive director at Fourth Partner Energy, said, “We currently have an aggressive target to achieve 3GW of solar capacity across all our verticals by 2025. This will mean significantly scaling up our current portfolio while growing our battery storage, energy trading and EV charging capabilities.”

A long-term and patient capital provider like CDC fits perfectly into company’s financing ecosystem, he said. In 2020, the company secured a Rs 110 crore funding from Swiss climate action fund ResponsAbility and a Rs 126 crore investment from a consortium of European lenders, led by Symbiotics. Fourth Partner Energy has also tied up with Lithium Urban Technologies to form a 50:50 JV, Shuchi Anant Virya to offer EV charging infrastructure solutions. The JV has commissioned EV charging hubs across Gurugram, Pune, Kolkata and has partnered with HPCL to set up chargers across its retail fuel outlets.