Reliance Industries picks up majority stake in VC-backed SenseHawk

Billionaire Mukesh Ambani-led Reliance Industries Ltd on Tuesday announced that it has signed definitive agreements to acquire a majority stake in solar software startup SenseHawk Inc for a total transaction value of $32 million (Rs 255 crore). 

The newly infused capital will be primarily utilized by SenseHawk for future growth, commercial rollout of products and research and development, as per a press statement. 

The four-year-old startup's cloud-based platform and application modules help address challenges in the development, construction and operation of solar sites. 

“RIL is committed to revolutionize the Green Energy sector and has a vision to enable 100 GW of solar energy by 2030. In collaboration with SenseHawk, we will drive down costs, enhance productivity and improve on-time performance to deliver the lowest LCoE for solar projects globally and make solar energy the go-to source of power in lockstep with our vision for solar energy,” said Ambani highlighting on the rationale behind the investment. 

California-headquartered SenseHawk claims that it has helped over 140 customers in 15 countries adopt new technology for their over 600 sites and assets totalling more than 100 GW(gigawatts). 

SenseHawk offers end-to-end management of solar asset lifecycles. For example, the platform enables unification of multiple processes and data into a single GIS(geographic information system) supported view for dashboarding, land data management, design option management, BOQs, approvals and more. 

It also provides improved communications between project teams enabling early issue detection and onsite resolution and automated progress reports among other things. 

“We are on a mission to improve the solar energy ecosystem, acquiring 50% of the market by 2025 and with RIL as our partner, we will accelerate on our execution toward that goal,” said Swarup Mavanoor, chief executive officer at SenseHawk. 

The firm counts Alpha Wave Incubation and Elevation Capital among its institutional investors. 

Reliance Retail Ventures Ltd, the retail unit of Reliance Industries Ltd has offlate been on acquisition spree. 

On Monday, VCCircle reported that Reliance Retail has bought a controlling stake in makeup and personal care brand Insight Cosmetics, marking the entry of Mukesh Ambani-owned company into the cosmetic business. 

In May, RRVL was reportedly in advanced stages of talks to buy a controlling stake in a Mumbai-based women's footwear brand. 

In March, RRVL bought an 89% stake in Purple Panda Fashions Pvt. Ltd, which owns and operates women-focussed innerwear and loungewear brand Clovia. This was part of Reliance’s strategy to get a stronger foothold in the organized fashion market and follows its investments in a string of homegrown labels such as Abraham & Thakore and Anamika Khanna. 

In January, it picked up 54% stake in warehouse robotics company Addverb Technologies for $132 million (Rs 983 crore back then). VCCircle was the first to report about the development in December.