Electricity retailer Amber buys Powerpal for $9.5 million

Electricity retailer Amber buys Powerpal for $9.5 million

Amber co-founders Chris Thompson (left) and Dan Adams.

Within two months of completing a $13.4 million Series B extension backed by NRMA, Commonwealth Bank (ASX: CBA) and Square Peg, renewables-focused electricity retailer Amber has announced the $9.5 million acquisition of energy app Powerpal through a mix of cash and scrip.

The retailer already gives customers access to real-time wholesale electricity prices, and its technology automates devices in the home to use more cheap, renewable power when it’s available in the grid.

Now the Melbourne-headquartered group will have another string in its bow with the Powerpal app and monitoring device, which are used by 200,000 homes to manage their energy consumption.

The Powerpal app helps households understand how and why their homes are using energy through real-time feedback, providing personalised recommendations or actions that can reduce energy bills and carbon emissions, such as replacing inefficient appliances or changing consumption patterns.

It is an app that has already helped to reduce emissions by an estimated 74,000 tonnes of CO2 - equivalent to taking almost 25,000 less fuel efficient cars off the road for a year - saving Australians nearly $24 million on their energy bills in the process.

Powerpal app and monitoring device.
Powerpal app and monitoring device.

 

Amber claims the acquisition cements its position as the leading electricity retailer offering real time information on energy usage that helps customers cut costs while supporting the climate.

"We believe in giving our customers the best access to their energy data so they have more control over their energy usage, costs and the amount of renewables they are using,” says Amber co-CEO Chris Thompson.

"This acquisition is a perfect fit for Amber’s customers in particular, as those who choose to get a Powerpal device installed will have their real-time energy usage data at their fingertips for the first time.

"By having access to the wholesale price of electricity, their energy data, and our automation technology, our customers are directly benefiting by competing with big coal and gas generators."

Powerpal CEO Peter Neal says his team shares Amber’s vision that it’s everyday Aussies who should benefit from the renewable energy transition, and not ‘big energy’.

"Having already helped hundreds of thousands of homes to improve their energy efficiency, we are incredibly excited to be joining Amber on their mission to help our users reduce their bills even further by using energy when it’s cheapest and greenest," Neal said.

Amber's recent $13.4 million raise was for the continued development of its recently launched Amber for Batteries technology, which helps battery customers to automate their batteries to charge when energy is the cheapest - through renewables - and then sell to the grid when energy is most expensive.

In May 2021 CBA invested $20 million into the business as part of an apparent strategy to continue to weave in new plug-ins and offerings to its own app to embed deeper usage from customers, as well as cross-pollination of its own products via Amber's app.

 

 

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