Big funds for Brazilian renewable energy maverick Delfos

Contxto – Brazilian tech firm Delfos recently raised over 1.5 million reais (around US$400 thousand) following first-round investments from EDP Ventures; Bossa Nova and BMG Uptech.

With Portuguese accelerator EDP leading efforts, Delfos will continue perfecting its software to monitor, analyze and predict renewable energy assets.

“The current investment round is to finalize certain features of the platform regarding failure prediction and unstructured data analysis or capabilities,” said CEO Guilherme Studart during a recent interview with Contxto.

“Basically, the money will be used to hire more manpower to develop the features needed.”

What does Delfos do?

Delfos’ mission is to equip partners with optimal knowledge of renewable energy holdings. Armed with their SaaS platform; customers gain valuable insights based on a wealth of operational data. As a result, enterprises can avoid energy loss based on several key performance indicators.

“We collect all the data that is already available on site,” said Studart, pointing out that Delfos doesn’t install any additional plugins or hardware.

“After the data is collected, we use our AI-powered platform to create a ‘digital clone’ of each asset and compare its current performance and behavior with the digital clone. The insights generated by the algorithms will indicate performance deviations, failure probabilities and the root cause of underperformance.”

Overall, with reliable statistics comes better performance since users can see what’s working versus what’s not. Truly, it’s the art of comparing and contrasting renewable energy output. From wind turbines to solar panels, these algorithms help stakeholders make better predictions, reduce uncertainties and gain new insights.

Delfos’ Saas

When it comes to its software services, Delfos’ platform is divided between five modules for wind, hydro and solar partners.

These components include management overview, performance, reliability, prediction and continual knowledge. With the customer in mind, these factors are the perfect recipe for success.

What are some of Delfos’ plans?

It’s only a matter of time until Delfos expands out of Brazil. Although the company doesn’t operate anywhere else, Delfos has its eyes set on European markets.

“In 2018, we developed a pilot project with EDP Renewables involving a wind farm in Belgium,” said Studart, who hopes to leverage on EDP’s footsteps in the region.

This year, we will continue to deploy pilot projects with strategic partners such as EDP outside Brazil.

Guilherme Studart, Delfos’ CEO

Hopefully, Delfos will also invest in Latin America due to the continent’s massive renewable energy potential. Between 2012 and 2015, approximately US$54 million went into emerging markets in Brazil, Chile and Mexico. Renewable energy sources also account for 25 percent of Latin America’s natural energy supply, twice as much than the global average.

Conclusion

Once again, this is very exciting news for Brazil. Granted that Europe has a more advanced infrastructure for renewable energy, we’re confident that new opportunities await Latin America. Rest assured that Delfos will play an influential role.

-JA