Whilst not unexpected it's great to see investment levels in clean energy at this level. It's not a surprise either that much of that investment has come into hybrid/EV vehicles and V2G battery solutions.
Large investments and M&A activity is particularly strong in EV-Charging infrastructure. Recently client EV-Box was acquired by ENGIE, and American EV superpower Chargepoint receiving over $80m from investors including Daimler. We expect to see other significant investments in the coming weeks.
As ever, we continue to support such high growth, and recently invested businesses achieve their growth strategies by introducing and recruiting the very best business and sales leaders.
In the first quarter of 2017, battery storage, smart grid and energy efficiency companies attracted $435 million in venture capital (VC) funding (including private equity and corporate venture capital), the latest quarterly report by Mercom Capital Group has found. VC funding for smart grid companies reached $164 million in 14 deals, compared to Q1 2016 when $110 million was raised in 14 deals. In comparison to Q4 2016, the amount increased threefold from $46 million invested across six deals. Forty investors took part in the smart grid VC funding rounds this quarter, with those focused on PHEV and V2G technology raising the most.
