Photograph — Fortune

Beacon Power Services (BPS) provides data analytics and grid management solutions that enable utilities and Commercial and Industrial (C&I) customers to better manage their energy assets. Founded in 2014, BPS offers electric utilities software and systems to improve the efficiency of electricity distribution. As a result of BPS’s software platforms, utilities are able to reduce technical, commercial and collection losses across their transmission network. A key outcome of better asset management is improved energy access for utility customers: more hours of electricity for the same amount of energy injected into the electricity transmission system. For C&I customers, BPS’s energy management platform allows them to optimize the timing and volume of diesel-generated electricity. The result is lower spending on diesel. This is good both for the environment and user finances.  

BPS currently operates in Nigeria and Ghana and plans to expand its services to other African countries. Persistent is proud to support BPS as it works towards helping businesses and households reduce their energy costs and increase their energy efficiency amidst rising diesel prices.  

Utilities delivering electricity to over 8 million customers (households and businesses) use BPS’s utility management platform. A few hundred C&I customers also use their energy services management platform to manage and optimize their energy consumption level and mix. BPS’s approach and relationship with its clients create unique opportunities to support C&I customers’ desires to optimize their energy mix towards more renewable and lower-cost energy options. 

Persistent Senior Venture Builder Toukam Ngoufanke says: “At Persistent we believe that platform solutions like BPS create efficiencies and reduce energy waste. Amid rising energy costs in Africa as well as the rest of the World, BPS’s technology is great for the environment, great for households, and great for businesses. This fits right into our mission as Africa’s climate venture builder. We are thrilled to journey with Bim Adisa, BPS’s founder, and his capable team.”  

Bim Adisa, an entrepreneur and BPS founder, has a wide experience in energy finance and engineering that spans Africa, North America, Europe and Asia. He is passionate about solving the tough problems that power utilities and their customers across Africa face. BPS’s products today have helped increase the daily availability of electricity by over 25 per cent across some of Africa’s largest cities. 

BPS’s Bim Adisa says: “It is impossible for Africa to develop without significantly improving energy access and reliability across its major cities. When we realized that the technology designed for developed markets fails to address Africa’s unique infrastructure challenges, we developed our own solution tailored to the continent. We created a way to work with power companies to help increase reliable electricity supply for more hours daily, allowing consumers and businesses to decrease reliance on diesel generation, which reduces environmental pollution.” 

About Persistent Energy Capital LLC

Founded in 2012, Persistent is Africa’s Climate Venture Builder. Persistent is a leader and pioneer investor in the off-grid energy and e-mobility sectors in Sub-Saharan Africa, with over 20 early-stage investments in pay-as-you-go (PAYG) solar distributors, commercial and industrial solar (C&I), mini-grid developers, technology enablers and e-mobility companies. Persistent has contributed to improving five million lives, powering 600,000 households, avoiding over one million tons of CO2e, and creating 15,000 jobs. Its sector-defining publications and analysis underscore the firm’s commitment to a collaborative approach to accelerate the development of the climate sector.

About Beacon Power Services

Beacon Power Services is the leading provider of data and grid management solutions for Africa’s power sector. Its mission is to significantly enhance energy access for Africa’s cities. The goal of BPS is to improve the quality and duration of electricity supplied to Africa’s cities by creating smart grids across the continent and using data to reduce the considerable inefficiencies in the electricity distribution systems.

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