WinJi receives €1.65 Million loan guarantee from the Swiss Technology Fund
Bernhard Brodbeck - WinJi CEO
WinJi, a Swiss start-up that developed the innovative “True Power” renewable energy asset management platform, has been awarded a €1.65 Million (CHF 1.8 M) loan guarantee by the Swiss Technology Fund. This loan guarantee will facilitate WinJi’s upcoming debt-raising, with a view to accelerate the company’s growth and finance further platform developments.
Technology Fund successfully approved WinJi’s technology and business model as innovative, energy efficient and competitive in an in-depth due diligence. The purpose of the Technology Fund guarantee is to bridge the gap between equity financing during the start-up phase and regular corporate loans for established businesses. It exclusively caters to innovative Swiss-based cleantech Start-ups and SME that are already generating revenue and can show a reliable sales pipeline. By significantly reducing lender’s risk, the loan guarantee will enable WinJi to access favourable borrowing terms.
Established in 2016, WinJi has developed an intelligent online asset management solution to optimise production and operate renewable energy portfolios more efficiently. The cloud based ‘True Power’ Platform solution is fully scalable and incorporates patent-filed anomaly detection methods.
This intelligent platform can help renewable asset owners, asset managers and operators increase asset production by up to 5% and increase the Internal Rate of Return (IRR) of wind and solar projects by up to 50%. It also allows asset managers and owners to get a holistic understanding of existing underperformance and benchmarking to comparable assets outside their portfolio. The True Power platform enables even non-experts to ask the right questions at a commercial and technical level and to make the right decisions.
“Our Artificial Intelligence solution can significantly improve production and overall asset profitability. It allows for an automated, manufacturer-agnostic onboarding in less than a day and requires no hardware. It offers real time, fine granular park and portfolio reports, and delivers actionable measures to operators and asset managers to improve performance.”, said Bernhard Brodbeck, Founder & CEO of WinJi.
WinJi has already built a solid track record. The company analysed around 2 GW of wind and solar assets on 3 continents, and identified an average underperformance of 10%. It also recommended and implemented performance improvement measures that led to an increase in revenues of up to 4 times greater than its service fees.
“The support we are receiving from the Technology Fund is an important step forward in financing our company’s growth. We are in the right position to reach our short to mid-term objective, which is to become one of the top 3 advanced digital asset management solutions using artificial intelligence in the global renewables market.”, continued Brodbeck.
Simone Riedel Riley, General Manager of the Technology Fund, added: “Optimising the operation of wind and solar assets increases the renewable energy production. As a result, financial performance for the asset owner is improved and CO2 emissions in the energy sector are reduced. We are therefore pleased to support WinJi with a loan guarantee to finance the further development and marketing of its innovative TruePower software.”
