When tracking the quarter-to-quarter capital flows of money into the solar industry, it can be easy to forget that the raw numbers represent a series of distinct and separate events.
This is easier when the events in question cause the numbers to balloon in a given quarter, as the Microvast Power’s $400 million dollar funding round did for the battery storage industry in the second quarter of 2017.
As documented in Mercom Capital’s Q2 2017 Battery Storage, Smart Grid and Efficiency Funding & M&A report, Microvast’s funding round not only made up the vast majority of the $422 million in venture capital funding for battery storage start-ups during the quarter, but the bulk of the $480 million that such companies raised in the first half of the year.
Funding for Microvast, which has headquarters in Texas and China and makes batteries and battery chargers for electric vehicles including electric busses, came from CITIC Securities, CDH Investment and National Venture Capital.
However, other battery finance deals were also high during the quarter. Q2 saw seven debt and public market deals for battery storage companies, totaling $107 million – more than four times the total during Q1, and bringing the total of such funding in the first half of 2017 to more than double the first half of 2016.
Additionally, there was one battery storage project fund during the first half of 2017 for $152 million, as opposed to three such deals in the first half of 2016 which raised $195 million.
Additionally, Mercom reports three M&A transactions involving battery storage companies in the first half of 2017.
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