Hohm Energy

A first of its kind solar marketplace aggregator

Hohm Energy - A first of its kind solar marketplace aggregator

What is your take on the solar energy industry in South Africa at the moment? Is it an exciting space to be working in?

The solar photovoltaic (PV) sector is South Africa’s fastest growing industry and will be for the next five years. This is due largely to the escalating power cuts or “load shedding” that has been increasing over the last half decade. South Africa has experienced an average of “stage four” load shedding so far in 2023, equating to 4,000 megawatts (MW), meaning electricity has not been available to consumers for an average of 10 hours per day, every day this year so far.

This lack of service delivery of electricity is driving high demand for solar and battery systems in the residential, commercial, industrial, and agriculture sectors. A recent bottomup study by Hohm Energy of the solar PV demand in South Africa values the residential total addressable market at one trillion rand (USD$50 billion). This study was performed by counting the number of residential rooftops, taking into account their north-facing square meterage and tilt and overlaying that information with a household financial index to determine the sizes of solar systems appropriate for each household.

What is exciting about this space is that only about five percent of the market demand has been met to date. The number of households that would benefit from solar is in the region of about 4.2 million. The largest solar installation companies at the moment are only performing about 2,000 installations per month. This is one indicator to look at to understand the magnitude of demand and the limited supply of good solar installations in South Africa currently.

Can you briefly introduce Hohm Energy and the role it plays in the sector?

Hohm Energy is a first of its kind solar marketplace aggregator. What that means is that we are a tech platform that enables clients to do a solar assessment and generate an indicative solar proposal in under five minutes and then connect them to vetted

trusted installers, supply them with top Tier 1 products, and through our finance partners provide them with options of financial products to fund the installation.

We originate out of the electrical metering and management business where we started an installation business back in 2013. We realised that we were severely constrained from scaling by the resource intensive process of meeting clients, manually developing proposals, doing marketing and more. We decided to build an application that could automate much of this process to enable working at scale for us and our partners, and so Hohm Energy was born.

Following on from above, what we offer clients is the ability to quickly understand their solar requirements, connect them with vetted installers and assist them in accessing funding

for their solution, all while taking a high-touch approach and walking the journey with the client – our product is trust, and we offer this service nationwide. Our signups exceed 30,000,

involves offering solar as a subscription service option to clients.

In addition, we are partnering with dominant players in the mortgage origination space and retail space to gain more presence in the market.

Projects aside, are there any key investments or other things you’re working on that you’d like to pay

green energy transition by being the leading solar marketplace, supported by values of accountability, trust and customer service excellence.

Our most notable project currently on the go is the partnership between Hohm Energy and Glint Finance, which

We are in the process of developing the Hohm Energy Virtual Power Plant (VPP) platform. A VPP is a software platform that communicates with and receives electricity from distributed energy resources and battery storage, with this electricity then being distributed to where it is needed most. By operating a localised VPP within a city or residential municipality, it is possible to power the homes within the chosen area that do not have solar installations with electricity from the homes that are producing and storing solar-based electricity.

This will be South Africa’s first locally developed VPP that has been designed according to the nation’s unique context, and one addressing its current energy crisis.

Our core mission is to facilitate the green energy transition by being the leading solar marketplace, supported by values of accountability, trust and service excellence.

- Hohm Energy

Could you elaborate on Hohm Energy’s relationship with the South African Photovoltaic Industry Association (SAPVIA)? Stemming from this, how does the company envision the future of PV usage in Africa?

We have been a sponsor of SAPVIA for the past two years. They play a pivotal role in PV in South Africa through their GreenCard Accreditation. A more qualified and connected installer base is vital to ensure quality. This is also better for everyone in the ecosystem, but especially clients who are parting with large amounts of capital to install solar and require that these systems are properly installed. Hohm Energy is taking an active role to elevate the quality of installers in South Africa beyond the benefit just to the company.

The future of PV usage in South Africa is bright. Projections show that over

two million households will receive solar installations between June 2023 and June 2025. The sector has a fragmented nature at present and Hohm Energy believes through its scalable marketplace ecosystem approach that we can satisfy a substantial 40 percent of this demand. In light of this, we are very focused on scaling our platform and growing our market share. Additionally, we are onboarding the leading financial service providers as well as an innovative new solar finance subscription offering. www.hohmenergy.co.za