POELLATH advises Enpal on EUR 100 million financing round

Berlin — Berlin-based solar start-up Enpal has raised another EUR 100 million in its largest finan­cing round to date.

The round of inves­tors was led by HV Capi­tal; other inves­tors included Thomas Grie­sel, foun­der of the cooking box company HelloFresh, as well as Chris­to­pher Muhr, ex-mana­­ger of the used car trading plat­form Auto1, and Peter Rive, cousin of Elon Musk and co-foun­­der of the green energy produ­cer Solar­city. In addi­tion, many exis­ting inves­tors, such as the foun­ders of the mail order company Zalando, are also on board, as is the venture capi­tal firm Picus Capi­tal with Alex­an­der Samwer or Lukasz Gadow­ski, the foun­der of the current Dax company Deli­very Hero. Actor Leonardo DiCa­prio is also indi­rectly invol­ved through an invest­ment by the Climate Tech­no­logy Fund.

Enpal offers solar panels and batte­ries for rent instead of purchase start­ing at EUR 49/month. This price alre­ady includes instal­la­tion, main­ten­ance and insu­rance. The self-gene­ra­­ted elec­tri­city belongs to the custo­mer, who can purchase the plant at the end of the contract period for a symbo­lic price of one euro. The aim is to make it chea­per and, above all, more conve­ni­ent for homeow­ners to install a photo­vol­taic system. The busi­ness model has its model in the USA, where the leasing of solar plants has become estab­lished as a stan­dard solution.

Wall­bo­xes, char­ging stati­ons for elec­tric cars, will soon be available as part of the package. Rene­wa­ble heating solu­ti­ons will also be available in the leasing model in the future. The online solar provi­der was foun­ded in 2017 by Mario Kohle, co-foun­­der of Around­home (form­erly known as Käufer­por­tal), and claims to have comple­ted more than 8,000 solar projects in the mean­time. This makes Enpal a leader in solar leasing and has tripled its earnings with over 4,500 systems instal­led in 2020. No other German solar company mana­ged this.

POELLATH advi­sed Enpal also in the context of this finan­cing round with the follo­wing team:
Chris­tian Tönies, LL.M. Eur. (Part­ner, Lead Part­ner, M&A/VC, Munich/Berlin)
Dr. Sebas­tian Gerlin­ger, LL.M. (Coun­sel, M&A/VC, Munich/Berlin)
Markus Döll­ner (Senior Asso­ciate, M&A/VC, Munich)