NextEnergy Acquires First Asset in India, Solar Plant From IBC SOLAR

NextPower III, NextEnergy Capital’s third institutional solar fund, has completed its first acquisition in India – a 27.4 MWp plant in Odisha from IBC SOLAR

NextPower III, NextEnergy Capital’s third institutional solar fund, has announced that it has completed its first acquisition in India. The fund has acquired a 27.4 MWp plant in Odisha from IBC SOLAR Energy GmbH, the international project division of IBC SOLAR AG, a leading global system house for photovoltaics (PV) and energy storage based in Germany.  IBC SOLAR constructed the plant and operated it since May 2018.

The plant benefits from a long-term power purchase agreement (PPA) in place with an investment-grade off-taker (AA+ rated), with a term of 25 years with 100 percent of the revenues contracted

NextPower III’s capacity in operation and under construction, across six projects is now 385 MWp in multiple geographies, and it has 8 further projects under exclusivity with a total capacity of circa 800 MWp.

Filinto Martins, Managing Director and Head of NextPower III, said “this acquisition allows NextPower III to further increase its presence globally and enter the Asia Pacific market where we have secured a pipeline of further opportunities. The transaction is another opportunity to execute on an operating asset in a carefully selected country (where the NextEnergy Capital Group has been present for over two years through its asset management company WiseEnergy), at attractive risk-adjusted returns. India has a strong focus on the transition to renewable energy and we are proud to play a significant part in that.”

NextPower III’s investment strategy is to acquire solar power plants at the ready-to-build status or in operation across high-growth international markets. The investment team is currently focusing its efforts to increase the portfolios in its carefully selected geographies including the USA, Latin America, Southern Europe, and India, where NPIII has ongoing transactions and expects to announce further acquisitions during the third quarter of 2020.

Aldo Beolchini, Managing Partner and Chief Investment Officer, said “we are particularly pleased to announce this transaction in the rapidly expanding Indian solar market, which currently has one of the world’s largest expansion plans in renewable energy. It testifies to the international execution capabilities of the NextEnergy Capital team, especially in the current difficult business climate, which the team has been able to navigate smoothly. We continue to monitor the COVID-19 situation and are very pleased with how robust and resilient our NextPower III fund has been in this environment. We are on track to build a target portfolio for NextPower III of around 2.5 GW installed solar capacity across carefully selected geographies.”